


Knowing

by N3kkra



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Adventure & Romance, Be Careful What You Wish For, Eventual Romance, F/M, I should have finished the game first, Leveling isn't a thing, Minor canon divergence, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Self-Insert, Slow Burn, Sort Of, Tags May Change, i wasn't ready, there might be smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-06-11
Packaged: 2019-03-21 01:25:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 38,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13730166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/N3kkra/pseuds/N3kkra
Summary: “Be careful what you wish for,” they say. I knew better than to wish for things I didn’t know anything about. But I knew A LOT about video games. I thought I’d be prepared for life inside of one, but Inquisition was dead set on proving me wrong.





	1. My Life is Like a Video Game

**Author's Note:**

> I've always wondered what it would be like to be in a video game, and Skyrim VR reawoke that wish. Now I've gone and started this, so I need to know what you all think!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From my bed to Thedas in a trip through the Fade.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Life is Like a Video Game  
> ~Game Over; Falling in Reverse

            I hit the bed with a sigh. The headache was fading away, but the burning in my left calf wasn’t. That wouldn’t finish healing for a few weeks or longer. At least I didn’t have to worry about anything touching it, especially now that I was home, in my comfy bed, ready for sleep.

            The baggy pants I wore were rolled up to the left knee so that my calf could breathe and the lotion I just put on the tattoo wouldn’t cling to the fabric. I couldn’t get under the covers just yet, not until the lotion settled in a bit more. So I rested on top, face propped up on a decorative pillow that found the floor during the nights, as it wasn’t useful but for moments like this.

            Sleep came faster than I expected, but I wasn’t totally lost to it as I drifted off. The music playing on my TV was the menu song for Dragon Age Inquisition. The never-ending line of mages and templars walked, single file, up to the Temple of Sacred Ashes. The Conclave called to settle the war between them, but alas, they couldn’t know what would actually happen.

            I smiled into my pillow. I loved this game. The soundtrack was wonderful, and this opening song I could hum along to it.

            I had never felt sleep take over like this before. Normally, I realized I was sleeping and jerked awake, but this time I could hear the music fade off and feel my limbs lighten. It almost felt like I was being suspended, supported only by the blanket under me. It was such a strange feeling I tried to hold onto it, focusing on that instead of any other detail.

            But like all dreams for me, the moment I focused, I lost it. The dream fractured and I fell.

            Really fell.

            I hit the ground with a grunt and rolled onto my back. Had I just fallen out of bed?

            I blinked a few times before freezing. I was surrounded by black and green mist. The ground under me was cold and hard. Every breath of mine echoed like I stood in a cave but I could not see a wall or ceiling no matter the distance. It wasn’t claustrophobic, in fact, it was the opposite, it was too open. There was nothing, nothing but alien rocks cast in green stretching up to a foggy emerald sky, dancing with blacks and greys.

            It was familiar, this place, I’d seen it before. But I shouldn’t be here, and it shouldn’t look so very, very real.

            Skittering over rock echoed toward me, bouncing off of the odd formations. I jumped up too quickly and then spun around. I couldn’t see whatever was making the noise. Before, when I’d seen this place, witnessed this scene, it had been spiders, but now… it was nothing, but it was coming for me.

            Fear flushed through me, picked up and carried along with my swift heartbeat, and I turned away from it, running down what appeared to be a path. It dipped farther down into the ground before bolting up, steeply rising toward what looked to be a white glow.

            A white glow? That was–

            I clambered up the stairs, rushing, pushing higher, faster. My lungs burned and my legs protested the abuse, but I knew I had to reach the woman. The glowing woman reaching for me at the summit. She would save me.

            The clicking of limbs drummed out a horrifying cadence as they drew closer. I couldn’t resist, I looked back and regretted it. It was something, a lot of somethings, but they were empty things, coming after me like a void of presence in force. I never thought I would fear _nothing_ like I did that which chased me now.

            I turned back to the glowing woman and sped up the stairs, reaching with my left hand for her outstretched one. And when our fingertips nearly touched, a green light flashed from my hand, and I fell again.

            This time when I hit the ground, it was warm, like fires were nearby, and weak to the touch like gravel and loose dirt. I didn’t see much before I faded again, but I heard several sets of footsteps come my way.

 

 

            Pain bolted through my arm like liquid fire in my veins. I shot up with a gasp and jerked both arms around, discovering them bound together with bar cuffs. I didn’t get to look at them long before a green light flashed, fast as lightning from my palm, and the agony followed, rolling like thunder up into my bicep.

            The throbbing brought tears to my eyes. The burning under my skin was unlike anything I’d suffered before, and not even the discomfort of sitting on my fresh tattoo could distract me from it. What happened to me? I had just dreamed I was in Inquisition’s opening cutscene and now–

            Another flash and pain rolled with it. I cried out and fell forward, my bound hands barely able to stop me from eating rock. Rock? Bound? Wait, I was still dreaming of Inquisition? But what about this pain? I’ve never felt anything like this before in a dream.

            I looked up, forcing myself to focus, to look at the little details, to find the flaw in the dream, but instead, I found four soldiers with swords drawn on me, watching me with eyes shining in the torchlight. The cell. I was in the cell. That meant they’d be here soo–

            The door flew open with enough strength to bounce off the wall, but the woman walking through it ignored it. She came forward, circling me as the soldiers sheathed their weapons. The second woman came in slower, stopping the door with a steady hand. I couldn’t help but feel a prick of amazement at the whole situation. It just looked… felt so _real_.

            Cassandra Pentaghast was here, right behind me, and Leliana was there, watching us from the doorway, her face carefully masked with indifference.

            “Tell me why we shouldn’t kill you now,” Cassandra growled behind my left ear. Her accent was thicker than I remembered it, the words coming across deeper and it felt… like she was there, speaking to me. It made me shudder.

            “Shit,” I breathed when she pulled back. She had been one thing on screen, but being interrogated by her was nothing like watching her speak to my character in the game.

            She seemed to ignore my comment and continued, “The Conclave is destroyed. Everyone who attended is dead. Except,” she stepped around me and pointed gloved fingers at me, “For you.”

            With her brows drawn close and heavy over her shadowed eyes, the Nevarran woman was a sight. Her cropped black hair was crowned with an infinity braid around it, giving the impression of hidden length. Her armor was shined with care but bore scars, the cloth with the white eye and sun emblazoned on her front was stained with black and green smears. Demon blood? Wait, did demons bleed? That was… new.

            In the moment I took to stare at her, Cassandra assumed I was opting to stay silent, either in fear or defiance, I couldn’t tell. Her patience held no candle to her game self. She stepped forward and seized my left arm, jerking it up so that I could see it. “Explain _this_ ,” she growled, her low voice hitting me square in the chest. To punctuate her demand, the green light flashed and fire rolled through my veins.

            I yelped and she threw my hand down into my lap. I tried to school my expression, but I couldn’t get through the pain. My teeth ground together, and briefly, I looked at Leliana. Cloaked in a deep lavender, she was far more intimidating than her game-self would have you believe. She was beautiful, pale face framed with wisps of untamed orange hair trying to get out from under her hood. But the blue of her eyes was cast into shadow, making her stare sinister.

            The sick part of this situation was I could explain it. Everything –well, almost everything. I was only a couple of missions away from the end of the game, but what would telling them the truth do? They wouldn’t believe me… would they? Was it worth the chance?

            “I… _can’t_ ,” I breathed, remembering the line from the game.

            “What do you mean you _can’t_?” Cassandra circled me, her tone unconvinced. Now Leliana came forward also, her interest still well hidden.

            “I _can’t_ explain it,” I pressed.

            She didn’t like that, probably more than she didn’t like the original dialogue in the game. The woman came to my front and seized me by the fabric of my t-shirt. It lifted me to my knees, but I heard it tear as my weight strained it. “You’re _lying_ ,” the words were loud, like a lion’s roar to the face. I was trembling, I could feel it, and hear it as the chains shook.

            Tears stung my eyes as fight for flight tried to kick in. I tried to move, to stand or to defend myself, but I was bound to the floor with leg braces. I hadn’t even noticed. Was that in the game? What more would be different?

            Leliana pushed Cassandra off of me, dropping me back to my hip. I hissed and tried to wipe the tears dripping down my face. I was dressed for bed, in thin, baggy pair of pajama pants and an oversized Game of Thrones t-shirt. I didn’t even have a _bra_ on. Or shoes. Fuck.

            “We need her, Cassandra,” Leliana whispered. I only caught it because I knew it from the game. They both looked at me and when I didn’t say anything, the woman in purple spoke again, “Do you remember what happened? How this began?”

            I looked down, away from them and wet my lips. Yeah, I remembered, I also remembered most of what came next. “I was in the Fade,” I said, looking up at them to confirm they knew that much. “I was being chased by… these things. And then a woman reached out to me, I tried–”

            “A woman?”

            I nodded and Cassandra stepped up to the other woman, forcing her toward the door, “Go to the forward camp, Leliana. I will take her to the Rift.” They both looked at me before the redhead departed. When she was gone, Cassandra came back to me and knelt to unchain me.

            “I’m sorry this happened,” I said, seeing her eyes more clearly now. She was focusing on her hands and wasn’t as good as Leliana at hiding her emotions. The whites were tinted with red, either from strain or tears, but the dark circles under them weren’t from smeared eyeliner.

            “You know what happened?” she paused to square her gaze on me and I buckled.

            “I don’t know what I know,” I said, honestly. Already little details were different, I couldn’t imagine what else would change. Well, it wasn’t really changing, it was just… realistic instead of a game.

            Cassandra seemed to consider what I said, and like the lie she rightfully pointed out earlier, she seemed to see the truth in my words and nodded, tying my hands together with rope. “It will be easier to show you the result.”

            Her tone had changed, softened. She wasn’t interrogating me anymore. I liked this Cassandra better.

            She pulled me up to my feet by my hands and then along toward the door. My feet padded noisily and I took a second to look at them. They were bruised like they’d been knocked around, and filthy, black from dirt and dust. The tattoos on them were barely noticeable like this. My nose wrinkled and I tugged at Cassandra’s hold on me. “Can I get something to wear?” I asked, my voice coming out a bit strained. I hadn’t realized how emotional I was getting. The stone under my feet was real, smooth cobbles, cold to the touch, and the wood grain in the walls was beyond what I would have been able to come up with. This wasn’t a dream, and it was more than just a game. But if it was Inquisition as I knew it, it was going to be snowing outside and I wasn’t dressed to be out there.

            Cassandra halted, looked me over and lifted her chin as if to consider it. She wasn’t a mean person, I knew this. She had reason and mercy, but right now she believed I was the cause of the Divine’s death, Most Holy, their equivalent to the Pope, or even more. And Cassandra suffered more than most because she had been the Divine’s right hand, and she felt she let her down. But none of this I was supposed to know yet, and if I told her I could be pegged a spy, or worse, a demon.

            Fuck. That was a legitimate fear. If I told the wrong people the wrong information about the future they could think me a demon, or at least in league with one. _Shit_.

            Cassandra made a disgusted noise, probably at herself and led me up to the main hall of the Chantry, but instead of taking me to the main doors, she stopped me outside of a room. “If you move, I’ll kill you,” she stated and I nodded my understanding. The words were weighed heavily with her accent, discarding any doubt. She disappeared into the room for less than a breath and returned, eyeing me as if to judge if I’d shifted my weight. Then, she held up a pair of ragged, old boots. “These should fit you,” she dropped them and pushed them to me with her foot.

            I slipped into them. Cassandra and I were a lot alike in size, the major difference being she was very clearly in shape and I very obviously wasn’t. I knew I was just shy of six feet tall, which put me at just above her height, but she was not a dainty woman. Being a warrior, she was built to take punishment, and she was comprised of muscle on muscle on strong bone. I, on the other hand, was built for playing such characters whilst sitting on my couch with a soda and bag of chips on hand.

            The boots weren’t going to be comfortable for long without socks, but it was better than being barefoot. I knew I was going to blister, I just hoped they wouldn’t bubble on any of the tattoos.

            My captor didn’t allow me to linger and pulled me by the elbow to the doors at the front of the Chantry. I spent the walk staring around at the detail and trying to blink the tears from my eyes. This was a dream, not literally –that I could tell– but being here to see what I’ve come to only know with decent graphics, but _real_.

            I could smell the smoke from the fire, the old wood, and even the faded stench of bodies that have come through here. The rugs were worn, but thick and well made, meant to take the abuse. The tapestries hung without a speck of dust resting on them from the open windows and doors, constant movement, and care from those within it. Too soon was Cassandra pulling me through the doors, blinding me with the morning light, tearing me from my interest.

            A guard held the door, eyes narrowed as I passed him. Cassandra waited for me, eyes locked on the sky. I knew I wasn’t ready for it, but I had to look. It was an overwhelming force, a bright light in the distance, brighter than the sun. I didn’t look at Haven, the small village I’d come to know, but instead, I froze in place and gaped at the sky, just as my character had.

            It was one thing to see it in the game, to disassociate with it, to note the graphics weren’t perfect, and that it just looked cool. This wasn’t cool. This was terrifying. It was a hole in the sky, a gaping maw that shouldn’t be there. It wasn’t a void, no, it was a _tear,_ festering as it spewed out green and black mist, and sucked up clouds and remains of the Temple at its source. It spat demons like rain, I could see the trails as they sped to the ground. And it pulsed with its own beat, like an ominous heart.

            “We call it ‘the Breach.’ It’s a massive rift into the world of demons that grows larger with each passing hour.” She turned back to me, her expression pinched back into interrogator mode, “It’s not the only such rift, just the largest. All were caused by the explosion at the Conclave.”

            Now I understood the wonder of my character when I repeated the line, “An explosion can do _that_?”

            “This one did,” she stated and came closer. She had been exposed to this for days at least already, I knew this, she had had time to get over its shock, but I wasn’t ready to tear my eyes from the sight. I’d seen it over and over in game, but _now_ it was _there_ and it wasn’t to be ignored. “Unless we act, the Breach may grow until it swallows the world,” when Cassandra finished her line the Breach flashed, and my palm copied with the same green light.

            It seemed to pull my hand toward it, raising them both, bound at the wrists, up as I fell to my knees. The pain pulled a scream out of me and I tried to flex my fingers, to pull against the magnetism, but the more I fought, the more it hurt. It was a burning rod being pushed up between the bones in my forearm, and then into the muscle and tendon of my upper arm. It hurt worse now that I could see the Breach, or maybe it was just because I was closer? A whole two hundred feet closer.

            Maybe because it was getting stronger.

            Cassandra knelt in front of me, pointing between the sky and me as she spoke, “Each time the Breach expands, your mark spreads… and it _is_ killing you.” She leaned closer, almost desperate, “It may be the key to stopping this, but there isn’t much time.”

            Now was the time my character would be prompted to ask her questions, but I knew them already. I knew why it was there and I knew why I had the mark, but I couldn’t tell her. I couldn’t act like I didn’t either, so I did the only thing I could think to do: I went with it. “I’ll do whatever I have to to make this right, Cassandra.”

            She blinked, her expression taken by surprise before she nodded and composed herself. She hadn’t expected me to say that, it wasn’t exactly what my character would have said, but it was nice to know she wasn’t limited programming. That thought also brought with it a troubling consideration. If I didn’t follow the game’s dialogue or actions, what would change?

            “Come, we have to get going,” she helped me up, grabbing me by the arm to heave me off my knees. The knees of my plaid pajamas were now wet and dirt-caked, but I didn’t say anything. It wouldn’t get me anywhere to complain about the state of my clothes. I was, however, starting to feel the bite of the Ferelden Frostback’s wind. It cut through my shirt and pants as if they weren’t even there. And I knew the hike to the Temple of Sacred Ashes was nothing to sneeze at.

            “They have decided your guilt. They need it.” As we walked through Haven, I looked at the faces of those glaring at me, arms crossed, faces tear stained. They were too real. No longer where they clean, shining faces from the cutscene in the game, and no longer was the walk from the chantry to the gates short and concise. “The people of Haven mourn our Most Holy, Divine Justinia, Head of the Chantry. The Conclave was hers.” Cassandra’s face gave away her pain, but when she noticed I was looking at her instead of at the people, she turned away, hand on my shoulder to keep me going in the direction desired. Out of Haven and toward the forest. “It was a chance for peace between mages and templars.” We strode up a path with trees on either side, toward the gated bridge to the mountains. “She brought their leaders together. Now, they are dead.” A guard parted the doors and we stepped out into the bridge. Cassandra stopped us. “We lash out, like the sky. But we must think beyond ourselves. As she did. Until the Breach is sealed.”

            The bridge had scattered supplies and carts packed into the sides, people in all weights of armor were sprinkled amongst them, doing whatever job they were assigned with little interest in Cassandra and myself.

            The warrior pulled a dagger from her belt and turned to me, brown eyes locked on my face, and for a brief moment, I wondered if she honestly wanted to kill me. “There will be a trial. I can promise no more.” She cut the binds on my wrists, not so gently, and added, “Come. It is not far.”

            “How far is ‘not far’?” I asked, looking up at the mountain. It was going to be a hike, I knew that, I knew that from the game, but this wasn’t watching my character trek up a mountainside, this was _me_ going the distance. No cutscenes, and definitely not running.

            “Not far,” she restated and gestured for me to take the lead, probably so she could keep an eye on me. I sighed and crossed the bridge and passed through the other gate, knowing my path was to the left beyond it.

            In the game, my character would jog everywhere, but that wasn’t going to happen, and I quickly found Cassandra to be perfectly fine with the pace I was setting as she kept an arm's length back and busied herself with looking up toward the sky. She didn’t have a comment for me, and based on the look on her face she didn’t seem like she was going to start a conversation.

            I found the landscape to be far more than the game could have supplied. The trees were thicker, plush with vegetation and stretched at varying heights as opposed to being two or three trees pasted side by side to make it look different. If that. I had never spent time looking that closely at the trees in the game. Now I couldn’t get over how _real_ it was.

            Christ, I was starting to annoy myself with my amazement at all of this. It couldn’t be a dream. It was like the stories I would write whilst sitting on my bed, talking to my roommates after class. Fuck, I would write this. The player going into the game?

            Shit, you’d think I’d at least finish the game first.

            My thoughts were interrupted by the mark on my hand –a light coming from within the crease of my palm– flashing and the Breach growing. I tripped on the snowy cobblestone and hit the ground, hard. I hadn’t tried to stop my fall, instead, I gripped my wrist as my hand shook and sent razors up my veins toward my heart, but never quite making it.

            Cassandra trotted up to my side and grabbed me by the shoulders, pulling me to my feet. “The pulses are coming faster now.” She wiped off the snow on my arm and stepped back, frowning at me like she wondered why I was dressed as I was. Sure I was wondering the same thing, but she had no way of knowing what a t-shirt was, let alone the Game of Thrones house sigils decorating the front. It was probably just as odd to her as me stepping out of the Fade.

            Okay, maybe not _that_ strange, but pretty damn close. At least I hadn’t been dressed in an Inquisition t-shirt, that would have made things awkward.

            But now my pants were damper, and my shirt had gotten some snow on it, meaning that every small gust of wind was freezing my skin. I lifted an arm to see the gooseflesh and sighed. My teeth had been chattering for a while, but it’d gone on long enough I’d actually forgotten about it. Cassandra seemed to take pity on me, looking me over like she almost regretted not giving me something more.

            “Come,” she gestured for me to continue and I passed her, watching where I stepped so as to avoid falling again. “The larger the Breach grows, the more Rifts appear, the more demons we face.” The list wasn’t so much for my understanding, as for her to speak her mind. “They say you stepped out of a Rift and fell unconscious. They say a woman was in the Rift behind you, no one knew who she was. Everything farther in the Valley was laid waste including the Temple of Sacred Ashes. I suppose you’ll see soon enough.”

            I could see how my surviving the blast would be so shocking. Something so devastating…. I ended up staring at the Breach again, my eyes squinting as I focused on it in the distance. Reaching up to adjust my glasses, my fingers brushed my temple and I froze. “Wait a second.”

            Cassandra froze and spun to face me, but I slammed my palm against my forehead and released a frustrated sigh. “What is it?” she asked, looking around.

            “I… don’t have my glasses.”

            “Glasses?” she frowned at me.

            “They, uh, help me see.” I crossed my arms, a shudder running down my spine. “I can see fine, but they just make things… clearer.”

            Cassandra looked like she was trying to understand the concept, and then made a disgusted noise and gestured for me to continue. “We are wasting time.”

            The warrior started marching on, obviously annoyed that I didn’t have the same sense of urgency as she did. It was probably rooted in my having played through this a few times already. This was the tutorial, nothing _really_ bad happened in the tutorial. And this part was safe.

            The ground between Cassandra and I grew dark. I didn’t notice it until I stepped into the blackened snow and realized it wasn’t liquid, but misty shadow. I gasped and leaped back as green bubbles surfaced in the pool. A long arm made of skinless black muscle and bone reached out, coming to the ground roughly so that the nails bit into the cobblestone.

            A greater shade’s head lifted up, straining as it crawled out of the hole like the rage demons in the game. It seemed to heave itself onto its belly before rising up to its full size –towering a foot over me. It had a helmet with a surmounted crest made of patchy, ugly black, stringy hair, and spiked shoulder guards giving its lean frame an inverted triangle’s shape. I wasn’t used to looking up at things, or people, and honestly, shades had never been all that imposing in the game, so standing before one now frozen me in place, shock and awe more so than fear.

            The detail was incredible. I could see each line of muscle bunch and twitch with its movement. The cloth draped around its waste looked as if it were made from burlap, and the belt holding it in place was old worn leather. Its chest heaved with breaths I couldn’t tell it was taking because it didn’t release puffs of smoke from its face like a living being would. Or at least Cassandra and I were. The helmet and shoulder plates were dull, looking almost dusty, but were scarred and chipped. This amount of detail would never have translated in the copy-pasted enemies that were spawned in game. They all looked alike, the exact same. I knew this wouldn’t be the case now, I could tell already just because of the difference between this one and the game model.

            Right about the time it was lifting its hand to rake four deadly bone-claws across my face, a sword tip burst from its chest and it arched back with a strangled cry, muted by the skin grown over it. Its voided eyes rolled around, impossible for me to see where it was actually looking. Startled, I jumped back and lifted my hands to defend myself.

            Cassandra kicked the demon off of her blade, to the ground and pressed her boot into it. Her sword arched, swerving so that the point found the brittle helm and broke through with a crunch. Or maybe the bone crunched. Either way, the sound was moist and green-black liquid sputtered out, splattering the blade, warrior, and me.

            My nose wrinkled and I looked at myself. Thankfully my clothes were dark, the stains wouldn’t be very apparent, but the smell–

            “Don’t just stand there,” Cassandra jerked her head toward the Breach. “There will be more.”

            I nodded and kept closer to her as we moved on. It wasn’t the presence of shade that shook me up, my mind wondered, taking less of an interest in my surroundings as I realized what the shade actually meant.

            So far everything had happened just as it had in the game –with the exception of some dialogue choices. So far, I knew exactly what was going to happen, save details that made it more realistic. But now… now I was being attacked before my character had in the game, and the enemy had been a _greater_ shade, not a simple, low-level one that the player learns combat on. It looked different, sure, but only greater shades had the mohawks and armor. It had been massive, too.

            This didn’t bode well for me. This implied there was no leveling system, that the attacks would be random. If there was no leveling system, then it was even less game-like, and that meant–

            “I could die.”

            The words slipped out as Cassandra and I reached a bridge. She looked over her shoulder at me and frowned. “What was that–?”

            Her question was cut off by my scream.

            Pain shot up through my arm as the Breach expanded and flashed the green mark at me tauntingly. An explosion of air splitting made me jolt up to see what it was, in time to see the massive green shadow ball plummet from the Breach, coming right at us.

            Oh, nice, they break the sound barrier.

            The bridge broke when the apparitional sphere struck it, shattering mortar and cobblestone. Cassandra had been closer to the center than I and fell first, unable to correct her footing or escape the drop. I, on the other hand, got to witness the warrior plunge out of view before experiencing one of my greatest fears.

            Falling.

            It was only a moment, but it scared me more than the shade had. My heart leaped into my throat, and I felt every muscle in my body tense. It made the impact hurt more, but it was an involuntary action, and the pain was welcome when compared to the weight of gravity against my being.

            My head struck the ice and I saw white for a second. A groan slipped out and I turned my head to see a grey-purple blur that might have been Cassandra. It danced around, two shining white objects flashed in its hands, one wide and the other long and narrow. Dark objects circled it. Cassandra fighting… what was that? Four demons?

            I pushed myself onto my hands and knees and rubbed my face, trying to find the source of the blur. My eyes weren’t _that_ bad.

            The tender spot above my temple told me I’d be feeling it for a while, but my vision focused after some careful breathing and determined blinking. Unfortunately, my hearing had been perfect the whole time and I was able to hear Cassandra growl along with her hostiles, screaming, “Maker take you!” at least twice as she felled them.

            This meant I also heard when one of the shades skated across the ice toward me, moving the same on the slick surface as it would on solid dirt. I was struggling to hold my quadruped self upright. It grabbed me by the collar of my shirt and I heard it tear more. _Fuck_ , I was going to lose this thing before I got a different set, and I didn’t particularly want to flash my breasts to the residents of Haven or the starting companions whose approval –even if it did not follow game logic– would surely decrease.

            I pulled myself up, bending so that my feet planted on a wooden plank and another on the ice, saving my shirt before the last of the seams gave in the throat. My foot kicked back and fell into the lower half of the beast. It let out a chuckle like it found my foot in its lower regions ticklish or the act of my struggling comical. Either way, it made me angry and I grabbed the wrist still gripping my shirt, twisting it over my shoulder so that the bone pressed into me and started to bend. It felt like grabbing a slab of raw ribeye, the muscle mushed between my fingers and then flexed when it started to struggle, but I could clearly feel the bone underneath it. The fingers curled so that the claws fused to the bone dug into my flesh, ripping my shirt.

            “Fuck!” I growled and let out a pained scream. The shade grabbed my side with its other hand and I felt the nails dig in, passed the flesh and into the fatty pudge I’d been wishing gone for the last five years.     

            I’ve never broken anything. I’ve never sprained anything. I’ve never fractured, hyperextended, torn, ripped anything or had a concussion. But this. _This_ was a pain I knew I was going to have to get used to because it was going to accompany me for however long I live in Thedas.

            That doesn’t mean I liked the feeling of my sides being ripped out.

            I screamed and wrenched the demon’s arm against my shoulder and heard it snap. Black ooze wet my shirt and the stench assaulted my nose. It got the thing to back off, though, and I fell to the ground.

            When the bridge collapsed, it didn’t break all the way through the ice –it’s too cold in Ferelden’s Frostbacks, and this pond seemed to be frozen solid– so the supplies, people, and cobble all lied about. Some of it having broken chunks of ice out, but I quickly found what I was looking for: a weapon’s chest. Just like the game, it was close by, but instead of having a single weapon set lying out for use, I noticed it to be a box of swords that had spilled open.

            I stepped forward only to fall to the ground and scream out, so loud it hurt my own ears. My side was bleeding profusely; I could smell the rusty tang. Bile rose in my throat, I thought I could taste it before it even reached my tongue. I threw up, unceremoniously, all over the ice and myself. I tried to push off and away from it, but I couldn’t get a grip and fell back into it.

            Hot tears fell down my face, burning with the fire in my side and in my mouth. It had taken over, and I wasn’t able to think of anything else but the white _pain_ shooting through me.

            I knew I was screaming, crying from the pain and trying to keep my airway clear, but I choked anyway, sucking in oxygen with the vomit. It was pitiful, and the demon thought so too.

            The shade wrapped its good hand’s fingers around my loose brown hair, tangling in the waves to get a grip at the roots and wrenched my head back so that I had to look up at its fugly face. It, too, had skin grown over its mouth, but the eyes were grey, dull like stone rather than voids. It had a leather cap with a single strap handing down the side of its head with a metal ring weighing it down. It moved its broken arm and then jerked its head to look down at the broken appendage.

            I sneered at it and spat whatever was in my mouth at the thing. It didn’t like that.

            It drove my face into the ice. My nose crunched and filled with blood. I tasted it as much as breathed it, and screamed again as I lashed my legs about and tried to get a grip on something. My hands were slick with… something, but I managed to grab its limp arm when it picked my face up again.

            I ripped and it threw my face down into the ice. I saw black, then white, and then I was on my back, coughing as something held me up and forced something down my throat.

            I screamed and choked, but strong hands held me still. I threw my arm up and hit something solid. A grunt –too human, too feminine– responded, and pushed me onto my side. I threw up again and groaned. The aching in my side was gone, and somehow my nose wasn’t in pain, but the burning in my throat and nostrils wasn’t alleviated.

            “You’re welcome,” Cassandra sighed, standing above me.

            I squinted at her and looked at the red spew on the ice in front of me. That wasn’t blood, it was a health potion’s contents. Well, it’s comforting to know it works, and it works rather quickly. Or so it felt, I couldn’t be sure how long I was out.

            “Thanks,” I heaved and turned over onto my stomach. My fingers were numb, my shirt and pants were torn, bloody, and puke-stained. Surprisingly, I didn’t care. Instead, I frowned at the pile of red bile and shook my head. “I haven’t thrown up in _years_.”

            “Count yourself lucky that’s all that happened.”

            “I can’t fight,” I said and pushed myself to my feet. It took me a second to steady myself, but the ice wasn’t as slick here, it had been roughed up by the warrior’s fight with the demons.

            “You did well,” she stated, but I shook my head.

            “I almost died –I… I would have…” I stopped and suddenly felt light-headed. I had almost died. I _would_ have died had she not had health potions on her. I would have…

            “Look at me,” Cassandra gripped my shoulders and forced me to look into her eyes. “Now is not the time. You are needed. I will get you to the Breach. Once we get to the Valley, there will be others. You will make it there, but you have to be the one to do it.”

            She was strangely soothing. Not in the nurturing motherly way, but the familiar, pick yourself up by your bootstraps way my parents were when things got rough. It reminded me of when I was young and my father would yell, ‘Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about.’ Of course, it didn’t work and I only cried more, but it was… oddly comforting to have the familiar strength, commanding me through this.

            “I’ll make it to the Breach.”

            “Come on,” she turned me around and pushed me toward the snowy hill. “I have three more potions. Let’s hope we don’t need them, shall we?”

            It wasn’t until we encountered another group of demons that I noticed I hadn’t picked up a sword from the box and I was completely defenseless against the demons. The first chance I got, I was going to get my hands on a set of armor and never take it off. This shit was ridiculous. The demons also seemed drawn to me. In the game, I attributed it to being the player character, but now I think it was the combination of being the easier target _and_ having the glowing green beacon on my hand, shining and making me whimper pathetically every few minutes.

            In the end, it took nearly two additional hours to climb up to the Valley. “We are getting close to the Rift. You can hear the fighting. We must help them.”

            Oh, here we go. I jogged to keep up with Cassandra as she ran up the steps and then followed the path to the Rift. I was behind her, huffing as I took the stairs as quickly as I could. I was used to running up to the second floor for my apartment and class, but this was more like trying to reach the fourth level in the last minutes before class started. I reached the top as my legs began to shake, and my breath wheezed. _Jeeze_ this place was going to kick my ass.

            I didn’t miss much, Rifts didn’t seem to follow the same rules as the game. Instead of sending out waves, the green tear in the sky shifted and convulsed, spitting out shades and other demons. They were nearly overwhelming, but those fighting weren’t your standard level one companions. No, I could clearly see Solas dancing with his staff, his movements practiced and precise. Similar to that of the game’s but with what seemed his own touch. His spells struck the demons with frightful accuracy, sending them back into the Fade from whence they came.

            I’d gotten so lost in watching him dance that I’d missed one of the wraiths coming my way. That was until Solas turned to me and waved his hand in front of him, as if clearing a table. My body lit up with a green light just as a flaming ball struck me in the chest. I stumbled from the push but didn’t feel it otherwise. Oh, well, that’s how those barriers work. Nifty.

            I looked back at Solas, but he was working on the wraith that attacked me. His staff flung top over bottom, shooting static through the air from each end before spinning in his hand and crashing to the ground, purple lightning cracked up to the sky and then struck down to vaporize the wraith, trailing from it through three other demons before ending. The smell of charred flesh, blood, and burning cloth hit my nose, but it had to compete with the still prominent smell of bile.

            When more demons came through, I got the idea that they weren’t stopping and ran forward, knowing I had to close the Rift, or at least disrupt it like you could in the game. I lifted my hand, but nothing happened. I stepped closer and felt panic rise in my chest. My eyes were still sore from crying before, but now they burned from the smell and the freezing wind whipping across my face.

            “Quickly! Before more come through!” Solas grabbed my wrist and pulled it up higher. The contact was hot, his hands were soft, but not totally void of callus. His long, thin fingers easily circled my joint and overlapped. Something else happened as he positioned me how he thought necessary. I felt a heat in his palm, it seemed to transfer to my hand, to the mark, and suddenly it shined bright.

            A stream of fluorescent green struck my hand, causing me to jerk, but the elf held me in place, his pale brows drawn together in concentration. It must have only taken a moment, but it felt like much longer as my strength waned and Solas’ grip started to become more supportive than instructive, the Rift closed, imploding in a way, closing as the hole in the air stitched itself shut.

            Solas released me and turned to throw spells again, a smile on his lips. “I did nothing, the credit is yours,” he stated, glancing at me as I stared at him. I knew it had been me, but being star struck by one of my favorite companions had me at a loss for words. I had always gotten along well with Solas in the game, he was one I seemed to easily impress with my choices, unlike Sera who I had to constantly look up. “Whatever magic opened the Breach in the sky also placed that mark upon your hand.” He cast a barrier at our feet to protect us from spells thrown by the wraiths, but now that the Rift was closed, they seemed to be easier to fight and were quickly dropping. “I theorized the mark might be able to close the Rifts that have opened in the Breach’s wake –and it seems I was correct.”

            “Meaning it could also close the Breach itself,” Cassandra pulled her sword from a demon and then looked around before coming closer.

            The familiar sling of a string followed by a _thud_ told me a crossbow had fired. But Solas was looked at Cassandra, and then back to me. “Possibly,” he stated simply, his accent making his words more attractive without seeming totally condescending. “It seems you hold the key to our salvation.”

            He had no idea. Or… maybe he did. Solas was a fishy character, one that I hadn’t quite figured out yet. Since I hadn’t finished the game, I knew I didn’t have the whole story, and from what I’d seen of him, I knew there was more.

            “Good to know, and here I thought we’d be ass deep in demons forever,” a familiar voice sounded off behind me. I turned in time to see Varric place his crossbow, Bianca, on his back, folded up and ready for use at a moment’s notice. The strawberry blonde dwarf looked just like his game self, down to the stubble lining his jaw and circling his mouth. He smiled up at me, his broken nose not taking away from the devilish grin, “Varric Tethras: rouge, storyteller, and occasionally, unwelcome tagalong.” He winked up at the Seeker beside me, and Cassandra made a disgusted noise.

            I couldn’t help it, I had to ask, just because I wanted Solas’ reaction. “Are you with the Chantry, or…?”

            The laugh that barked behind me was even better than in the game. The elf mage’s grin was wide, a sight you didn’t get to see often, but one that I always took the chance to see. He appeared to be a young man, but his eyes betrayed an age beyond his years. The only hair on his head were the ginger brows and the dark lashes about his grey-blue eyes. His cheeks and nose were dusted with freckles, a cute addition to his face to make him seem innocent, especially now with his face broadened by the smile that showed off perfect teeth. “Was that a serious question?”

            “Technically, I’m a prisoner, just like you,” Varric chuckled as he adjusted his glove casually.

            “I brought you here to tell your story to the Divine,” Cassandra sighed and cocked a hip out at him. “Clearly that is no longer necessary.” I didn’t miss how the words made her eyes shine.

            Varric noticed, but spoke as if he didn’t. “Yet, here I am. Lucky for you, considering current events.” He turned and smoothed his thumbs down the underside of his lapels, making sure the chest hair on his bared chest was perfectly on display.

            “That’s a nice crossbow you have there,” I gestured with a smile.

            He laughed, looking over his shoulder. “Ah, isn’t she? Bianca and I have been through a lot together. She’ll be great company in the Valley.”

            “Absolutely not. Your help is appreciated, Varric, but–” Cassandra started.

            “Have you been in the Valley lately, Seeker?” Varric inserted. “Your soldiers aren’t in control anymore. You need me.” The last statement was punctuated with a smile and tilted head. The Seeker made a disgusted noise and turned away from him.

            Solas stepped closer, his staff gripped in his hands as a support. He grinned, looking at me like a scientist would an experiment gone right. “My name is Solas, if there are to be introductions.”

            “Christiane von Faelenberg, Christi,” I offered.

            “I am pleased to see you still live,” the elf added, looking at my mark as it pulsed. I could feel a wave coming now, but the pain paled in comparison to the demon taking out my insides.

            “He means, ‘I kept that mark from killing you while you slept’,” Varric translated.

            “Solas is an apostate, well-versed in such matters,” the Seeker inserted.

            “Technically all mages are now apostates, Cassandra. My travels have allowed me to learn much of the Fade, far beyond the experience of any Circle Mage.” His accent made the words more melodic. I had always found his voice one of the most enjoyable. “I came to offer whatever help I can give with the Breach. If it is not closed, we are all doomed, regardless of origin.”

            “What will you do once this is over?”

            “One hopes those in power will remember who helped and who did not.” Then he turned to the warrior. “Cassandra, you should know: the magic involved here is unlike any I have seen. Your prisoner is no mage. Indeed, I find it difficult to imagine _any_ mage having such power.” I had never noticed how much he seemed to grin as he spoke. His mouth naturally curving up at the corners.

            “Understood. We must get to the forward camp quickly.”

            “Come on, Seeker, at least give her something practical to wear,” Varric looked me over and I felt a flush dust my cheeks.

            Right when she was about to speak, Solas jogged away, coming to a crate that had been abandoned. He flipped his staff around so that the length passed through his backpack’s straps and stuck to his back. He pulled out a few pieces of cloth and turned back, lifting the khaki pants and crimson shirt. I had to admit I liked the look of it far better than what I was currently wearing. It looked thicker and warmer, despite having been sitting in a chest in the cold.

            “Yes, please,” I breathed and looked at Cassandra, waiting for approval. She seemed mildly surprised, but pleased, at the respect and nodded. “Thank you.”

            I ran over to the elf and took the clothes, hoping to the Maker it fit. I emerged with the button up tight against my chest, and my stomach pressed in by the waistband of the pants. The boots overlapped the tapered leg of the khakis, but it wasn’t as comfortable as wearing my cowboy boots. I also didn’t care for how the waistline sat, but I knew better than to complain because my arms thanked me for shielding against the snowy wind. I smiled at the trio before me and then picked up a sword from a fallen soldier.

            I looked at his face and then away quickly. I didn’t want to lose my nerve when I had only just gotten it back. Instead, I took a deep breath and turned to the path that would take us toward the Breach. “Shall we?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my first self insert. It’s not really me, I’ve changed... my name? And I made myself single for... writing purposes xD and because I can’t write anything that doesn’t have romance in it. So I needed this to keep interested. Let me know what y’all think! I look forward to thoughts and comments and if you all have a particular think you want to my character to go through (finding where the bathroom is?). Keep in mind my character hasn’t finished the game. She has only gotten to the second to last main mission so there are some spoilers she doesn’t know are coming.


	2. I'm Just Trying to Keep from Dying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting to the Temple of Sacred Ashes isn't as easy as the game makes it. It's a LONG way up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm just trying to keep from dying  
> ~Game Over, Falling in Reverse

            “The Rift is gone! Open the gates!”

            “Yes, Lady Cassandra!”

            I heard the heavy wood and metal part, but I didn’t look at it. I was staring up at the Breach again. We’d come so far, I was sweaty, sore, and winded, breathing heavily despite my lack of actually having helped with the fighting. I kept close to Solas, made sure nothing got too close to him while he cast his spells, but he always managed to take care of us both better than I could him.

            None of them made fun of me, nor did they get frustrated with my out of shape self. It was nice and helped me retain the wading confidence in myself that I could even make it to the Temple of Sacred Ashes. My character had always been in shape, like my team, running everywhere with speed and efficiency, never slowing or even having to stop to sleep or eat unless a cutscene demanded it. I could feel my stomach twist with the need for food, and my throat burned for want for water. The headache behind my eyes was either the brightness or lack of caffeine in my system, maybe both, I resigned myself a while back to just squinting through it. Oh, shit, maybe it was from not wearing my glasses?

            A hand touched my shoulder and I flinched, calming the moment I turned to see a concerned Solas. “I did not mean to frighten you.”

            “I know, I’m just,” I cleared my throat and looked back up at it.

            “It _is_ impressive.”

            “You have no idea,” I breathed and bit my lip. There were two people in this game that would even remotely understand what I was going through, and both of them were here with me. Varric had already started guessing my origin, but since they didn’t know who I was previously, I guessed I hadn’t taken on one of the player characters’ origins so I was going to have to ‘spin a story.’ Varric and I were going to get on famously.

            “You seem to be feeling better,” the elf pointed out, his grey-blue eyes flicking back to the mark on my hand before returning to my face.

            “I don’t feel like I’m going to throw up,” I agreed. “Can’t say I feel better though.”

            “It will be over soon.”

            “That’s surprisingly optimistic of you,” I blurted. His brows drew together and he narrowed his eyes. Oops.

            “It would benefit me not to burden you with my worry,” he stated and I realized that he was just trying to make me feel better. He knew I wasn’t a fighter, it was _obvious_ I’ve never had to defend my life before, and all of this was happening so fast.

            “I’m sorry,” I sighed and he nodded his acceptance of it as he headed for the bridge.

            “…You, Cassandra, the Most Holy–haven’t you all done enough already?” a man’s voice echoed across the bridge. I glared at the Chancellor with squinted eyes.

            “Enough! I will not have it!”

            “Ah, here they come,” the elder man dressed in Chantry robes straightened and immediately found me behind the Seeker. Leliana came forward, looking just as she had before, maybe a little more tired. She adjusted her hood to get a better look at Cassandra, but didn’t remove it from her orange head.

            “You made it. Chancellor Roderick, this is–”

            “I know who she is,” he cut her off and lifted his chin, glaring at me. “As Grand Chancellor of the Chantry, I hereby order you to take this criminal to Val Royeaux to face execution.” His voice was final, without a doubt he _knew_ I had killed the Divine. It put a pit in my stomach, made me want to throw up. Instead of being angry that I was being accused of something I didn’t do, I was scared for the life I could barely hold onto here.

            Cassandra ever to the rescue stepped in front of me and turned her heavy scowl on the man behind the table. “‘ _Order me’?_ You are a glorified clerk. A _bureaucrat_!” The last word came out sounding worse than a swear.

            “And you are a thug, but a thug who supposedly serves the Chantry!” Roderick started, but Leliana flinched.

            “We serve the Most Holy, Chancellor, as you well know.” Her voice cracked and she looked away from him, biting her lip with her eyes squeezed shut tight. But he wasn’t done.

            Roderick lifted his hands. “Justinia is dead! We must elect a replacement, and obey _her_ orders on the matter!”

            “Excuse me, but we still have to close that,” I cut in, glancing at the hole in the sky.

            “You are a prisoner, _not_ a guest, and you will keep your mouth shut,” he stated slowly as if I were unable to understand him otherwise. Cassandra perked up, as if he’d spoken to her rather than me, and took her place between us so that I got a face full of the shield on her back. Before she could say anything else Roderick continued, “Call a retreat, Seeker. Our position here is hopeless.”

            She wasn’t convinced, “We can stop this before it’s too late.”

            I peeked around her to see the genuine concern on the Chancellor’s face. I knew he’d only ever done what he thought was right, but he wasn’t the most polite face around. Of course, it could be worse, he wasn’t trying to kill me himself, just have me sent off so someone _else_ could do it. “How?” he begged the Seeker. “You won’t survive long enough to reach the Temple, even with all your soldiers.”

            Cassandra stood steady, if she was shaken, she didn’t show it. “We must get to the Temple. It’s the quickest route.”

            “But not the safest,” Leliana cut in then. I’d nearly forgotten she was there, something about her silent presence made her easy to overlook even as you knew she was standing just feet away. “Our forces can charge as a distraction while you go through the mountains.” She gestured up toward the path and I followed with my eyes. The way was far more daunting than the path behind me that got me here. I was exhausted and my sides burned. Whatever adrenaline I’d acquired had already been flushed from me and I was left feeling the bite of the wind through my thick shirt

            Cassandra shifted her weight, drawing attention back to her as she crossed her arms defiantly. “We lost contact with an entire squad on that path. It is too risky.”

            Roderick took it in stride, “Listen to me. Abandon this now before more lives are lost!”

            Thunder cracked and my arm shook, pulling away from my side to reach for the Breach. I hissed at the knives running through my veins, up my arm toward my heart. I grabbed my wrist and tried to hold it down, to hold it in place or something. It shook and felt like someone else was controlling it, trying to pull it from its socket.

            And then it released me. The pulse stopped and my arm was mine again. Everyone was watching me, but only Varric seemed to show actual concern in his questioning gaze. Solas had that observational mask hiding whatever his personal feelings were, while Cassandra and Leliana simply watched me carefully. Roderick looked like he was considering shitting himself.

            Cassandra turned back to the Chancellor and purple-robed woman. “We’re charging with the troops. We do not have time to waste debating the matter.” I blinked and touched my ear, pressing it to see if there was anything obstructing my hearing before I spoke.

            “Do I not get a say?”

            The Seeker spun around and looked down her nose at me. Had she gotten taller? Shit. Cassandra’s glare was enough to silence me, but she spoke to make sure of it. “Do not overstep, you are still a prisoner. We only need that mark on your hand.”

            Solas moved into my peripheral. “Time is not our ally, Seeker, and threatening her gains no advantage.”

            The way his brows furrowed I could tell he didn’t like how she had spoken to me. It comforted me some, having his support. Unfortunately, I knew more than they did and spoke again. “If we don’t go into the mountains, we’ll lose the scouts up there.”

            Leliana stepped forward, “You know they’re alive?”

            I flinched and cleared my throat. “You lost contact, right? So you’re just assuming their dead?” The attempt seemed to satisfy Cassandra, but the spymaster’s narrowed gaze faded in a covered up kind of way, not sated.

            Varric waved his hand at me, “Sound logic, Seeker. We don’t know for sure until we see for ourselves.”

            “It will take too long,” she stated, her accent thickening as she grew irritated. “The soldiers in the Valley–”

            “Can handle themselves,” Leliana cut in and stepped in front of the other woman. “Cullen is with them.”

            My heart leaped at that. Cullen Rutherford. I’d completely forgotten about him. I was so caught up in the moment I hadn’t thought forward in anything other than plot. This could end at any point, this dream, whatever it was, and because of that thought, I hadn’t considered being able to actually meet him.

            I was suddenly distracted by the curiosity of him –wondering what about him would be different– and didn’t notice Cassandra glaring at me. I wet my lips and swallowed. “What?”

            “You want to go into the mountains, are you sure you can keep up?” she asked, no doubt a rephrasing of the question I’d missed.

            “I can keep up,” I nodded and gripped the sword in my hand tighter. She noticed and her nose twitched. I was holding it wrong, I had to be, but I had never been taught how to fight with a sword, I was probably better off with my fists.

            When I was young, my uncle would teach me how to defend myself against an attacker; but it had always been the ‘when you get jumped in the alley by a perv’ sort of defense. I knew how to get someone to stop choking me, I knew how to stop someone who was bigger but not faster, and I knew where to stick a knife to do a lot of damage. This sword was longer than my arm and heavy in my hand. Just from carrying it I was getting tired to the point I doubted I could actually swing it to do damage.

            All of my doubts must have been obvious to Cassandra, because she turned away from me with a disgusted noise and started toward the mountain. Roderick made a quip that I didn’t catch because of another pulse from the Breach. This one was oddly short and the sting felt like a hard slap that covered me from palm to shoulder. Once it was over, Solas started following the Seeker, his gaze trailing back to make sure I intended to follow. Only Varric waited until I started moving. He offered me a smile when I looked his way and I decided I liked the dwarf even more than I had previously.

 

 

            “You doing okay, Christi?” Varric asked. The snow was coming down thick enough I couldn’t see Solas above me. The wooden ladder was freezing, not slick yet, but holding onto it too long hurt my fingers, burning them with the chill. I glanced down to the dwarf and tried to smile.

            “I’m going as fast as I can.”

            “That’s not what I meant,” he said and shifted on his rung. “You obviously aren’t from around here, and you’ve never fought a day in your life. This must all be pretty… strange.”

            “I’ve fought a lot,” I said and climbed up a few more rungs, pausing to take a breath. “I just wasn’t the one _physically_ doing it.”

            There was a thoughtful pause from below me before he replied. “You write?”

            “Lots,” I laughed and reached the top. To my surprise, Cassandra was there and offered a hand. I took it gratefully and she patted my shoulder.

            “Keep your voices down, we don’t know what happened to the scouts.”

            I nodded, but Varric continued as she walked away. Solas wasn’t anywhere in sight, but he was no doubt nearby. “What do you write?”

            “Anything that comes to mind, fiction mostly, stuff like…” I almost said ‘this’ but wasn’t sure how he’d handle that, so I paused. “Well, stuff that other people don’t think about, you know? I make up my own worlds and people.”

            “Ah, the creative sort,” the dwarf laughed and nodded his understanding. “I met this human in Kirkwall who wanted to write about men from another world, small green creatures that came from the sky in flying ships shaped like disks.”

            “Oh?” I lifted a curious brow at him as we came to another ladder. “And what did you think of that?”

            “I told him he was crazy and no one would read it,” he said proudly and I couldn’t help but laugh.

            “Not a fan of extraterrestrials then, Varric?” I asked, climbing up the ladder.

            “Funny, that’s what he was going to call them, and no I’m not.”

            I nodded and climbed the rest of the way in silence. Finally, Solas materialized at the top, his staff resting in his hands as he squinted through the blizzard. I wondered if he was as cold as I was, his robes weren’t as form fitting as mine, but he did seem to have a layer or two on me. When I had my breath back, he nodded. “You’re doing well. I imagine this is quite different from what your body is used to.”

            “You have no idea,” I heaved and sucked in a deep breath, my hands on my hips to keep my lungs open.

            “Are you of noble birth?” His face was carefully neutral. I’d written enough stories to know when someone was testing waters. I was going to have to come up with a story if I wasn’t going to tell them the truth, and I was going to have to be very consistent.

            “Not really? My family’s well off, I’ve never been left wanting, but,” I shrugged, “I wouldn’t say they were nobility. My parents are both military, well, dad’s retired,” I added and Varric nodded his understanding and approval with pursed lips.

            “Yet, you have no combat training,” Solas pointed out and I let out a little laugh. I started following Cassandra.

            “I know how to fight, I’ve just never done it –never had to.” I stopped talking and moving when Cassandra lifted a hand. It translated to me as the inter-dimensional signal for ‘stop’ even though she had her back to us. Solas shifted his staff to one hand and stood half in front of me. Varric flanked him with Bianca out.

            Then the shades spilled out of the cave around the rock outcrop. I hadn’t realized we’d gotten to this point. It was all I could do to keep out of the way. There were a _lot_ of demons. Some of them in the form of shades, while others looked to have taken over the bodies of a few scouts. Cassandra seemed taken off guard by that and staggered when one of the scouts fired their bow, the arrow bouncing harmlessly off of her shield. It wasn’t a very good shot, but all it took was getting her in the right place and the Seeker would be dead.

            Solas spun his staff and slammed the blunt end into the wooden scaffolding we stood on. I felt it as much as heard it, when the lightning shot up from the weapon into the sky, lighting up the snowy air. Then it arched back down and chained through several demons and scouts.

            I knew how the magic worked in the video game, avoiding friendly-fire unless you upped the difficulty, but I wondered if Solas’ avoidance in hitting Cassandra was skill or situational.

            “Incoming,” Varric shouted and took a knee, Bianca strained with bolts. Solas cast a barrier at Cassandra’s feet, but a devouring corpse stumbled into the ring and its flesh lit up like hers did.

            Well, there was my answer.

            Varric let loose the bolts and Cassandra dropped, lifting her shield so that the mass that fell on her, bounced off with sharp metal on metal ticks. The green light over her flickered with each strike, as did the body’s that was slumping against her shield, reaching for her. Several others dropped, the demons falling back into the Fade, sucked away by the Rift out of sight.

            It wouldn’t stop until I closed it, I had to get around Cassandra and into that cave. I looked at Solas as he threw his staff around, the top and bottom shooting out strikes of lightning each time the end came to a hard stop in his grasp.

            “Solas, I need a barrier, I’m going to the Rift,” I called over the sound of screaming wind and fighting.

            He looked at me, his brows drawn together in concentration, but he nodded and waved his hand the same as before. The moment my body lit up, I sprinted forward. Exhaustion had never gripped me like it was now. Only once had I ran myself _literally_ into the ground: in gym in high school, we were doing suicide sprints and I ran myself until my legs gave out under me, sliding me across the floor enough to give me a burn on each leg. I hadn’t been this tired when that happened, but now I had another shot of adrenaline pumping through me, not as much as before, but the desperation was real.

            I _had_ to get to the Rift.

            So I did.

            I hit the ground in front of it, sliding through the snow so that my khaki pants touched the cold stone under it. I reached up for the Rift and cried out as the Breach flexed, spreading the mark on my hand down into my wrist. My veins glowed, tensing the muscles and curling my fingers. Teeth clenched, I screamed as I bridged a connection between the Rift and my mark. It was a sweet relief compared to the searing pain of the Breach or having my insides ripped out.

            It closed and I gulped down the crisp air, barely aware of what was happening around me. Something knocked me to the ground, causing my head to bounce, but I didn’t feel any pain from it. Not until I looked up and saw the shade reaching for me.

            I was still holding my sword, the grip tight enough to white my knuckles. I swung it wildly, hacking off the reaching arm more out of coincidence than intent. It reeled back, crying in pain as the green-black misty fluid sprayed onto me, staining my clothes just like Cassandra’s had been. Since it wasn’t coming at me, it made it easier to throw the sword forward into its chest.

            That didn’t kill it, but it gave me a chance to get to my feet and I swiped at it again, this time aiming for the head. The neck was muscular, thick, and had a spine. This caught my sword and when I pulled on it to take it back the creature screamed. It was agonizing and stung my ears so badly my teeth hurt. I ended up feeling sorry for the damned thing and my inability to end this quickly.

            My skin lit up green and before I could think what that meant, a purple flash of lightning struck the shade, blowing it inside out. The shock-chain jumped to me, right through my chest into a wraith coming my way. It faded away and I was left gasping for air.

            Solas was the first to check on me, his attentive gaze locked on my face before moving to my mark. “Are you hurt?”

            “I think I made it through this time,” I said and straightened up, feeling light-headed. I knew it was from lack of sustenance and overexertion, but I was sure the altitude didn’t help.

            “She appears fine, we have to keep moving,” Cassandra gave me a once over as she passed, heading deeper into the mine.

            “Have a heart, Seeker,” Varric called, his arms out in a disbelieving manner. “The girl needs a break, probably something to drink.”

            The warrior stopped and looked back, her eyes narrowed and she looked at each of us, seeming to dare someone else to speak. Solas took the verbal baton. “I agree, she’s grown pale, if we’re not careful, she will faint.”

            At the reference, I added, “I have low blood sugar, so I’m prone to… fainting.”

            I realized too late they probably didn’t know what having low blood sugar meant, but Cassandra’s patience seemed to be about gone. She rubbed at her hair, her gloved fingers roughing up her scalp. “We will see what is in these caves. We _cannot_ afford to delay.”

            When I nodded the other woman turned on her heels and started off. I gulped and peeked at each of my companions. “She seems upset.”

            “She is still in mourning,” Solas stated and Varric sighed.

            “Yeah, the Seeker’s a good woman though,” he started on after her, his short legs easy enough for Solas and I to keep up with.

            There wasn’t much in the way of food or drink in the mine. A few fruits that would keep fresh in the cold and some jerky that Solas suspected was ram or deer. The elf let me use his backpack to load the supplies while I stuck an apple in my mouth and sucked on the juices to ease the burning in my throat. Cassandra had continued on ahead and Varric paced between, checking on us while also making sure the Seeker didn’t run off or get attacked.

            “Here,” I handed Solas one of the last apples and then called to the dwarf so he looked when I tossed one to him. “We should all eat _something_ ,” I said and took another bite from mine, spinning the last in my hand as I made my way over to the warrior. “You too,” I held it out, in front of her so she didn’t have to look my way. “I’m sorry I can’t do better, Cassandra. But I want you to know I _do_ care.”

            The Seeker looked at me sideways, the brown of her irises catching the snow light to look paler, deeper. The red corners I knew were from unshed tears and freezing winds. “Thank you,” she tipped her head and took the apple. “I know I can be harsh…”

            “And I know why you are,” I stated and took a deep breath. “I understand.”

            She looked me over and then started walking away, biting into the apple with a little too much force. “There are tracks that lead this way, perhaps more raised bodies, or the rest of the scouts.”

            Varric tossed his core into the trees with some thick chunks still on it while Solas paused beside me, watching the other two put distance between us. The elf’s apple had been reduced to seeds, a stem, and a few hard center bits that didn’t make for good eating. I grinned at it before looking to his face.

            “That’s talent.”

            “Simply not wasteful,” he corrected and bent to brush his hand off into the snow.

            “Is it wasteful if a bird or other animal finds it and finishes it?” I asked and his face blanked, taken off guard. I wiggled a brow and started on after the others.

 

 

            It didn’t take long for us to reach the sound of fighting. Cassandra was off, running with a hand on her sword to keep it steady at her side. She was an inspiration and the rest of us followed on her heels. I, of course, lagged behind until we reached the Rift I had actually expected up here.

            Three scouts were fighting, worn down as they tried to protect a few injured companions. Cassandra took her shield down from her back and bashed it into a shade before thrusting her sword into it and pulling it out the side. I wasn’t able to watch her longer than a second because a bright red-orange spot caught my eye.

            The rage demon was usually a weaker opponent as it fed off of anger, the easiest emotion to focus on in a living being. It seemed to get stronger as it drew nearer to Cassandra. She was pissed, obviously, and it was feeding on that.

            “Solas,” I cried out to the mage.

            He nodded, “I see it.” The staff twirled and struck the ground, rooting itself with tendrils of ice that raced across the field to the lava beast. Steam hissed, but the ice stretched up over the demon, reaching as it spilled its liquid body out of the frost only to get encased again. Solas’ face twisted in concentration and the freeze moved faster, thicker, cocooning the burning creature until it was completely encased and stuck reaching for the dwarf that gave a laugh. Varric fired Bianca at the ice sculpture and it shattered, sending bits of melting ice all over.

            With the toughest guy down, I worked closer to the Rift. It was easier now, and within a few deep breaths, I had the sky stitched shut and the demons stopped coming through.

            Solas appeared over my shoulder, “Sealed, as before. You are becoming quite proficient at this.”

            Varric stepped up as I turned around to face the elf. “Let’s hope it works on the big one,” he gazed up at the Breach.

            The scouts that were saved were speaking with Cassandra, but she shook her head, gesturing to me. I offered a smile, but they looked me over before giving polite bows and departing. Well, that was…

            “We best move quickly,” the Seeker started off, down the slope toward the base of the hole in the sky.

            “The Temple of Sacred Ashes,” Solas breathed as we started toward it. “What’s left of it.”

            My heart gave a painful thump as I looked down at the crater.

            Bioware did a great job of showing scale in their games, I could remember clearly, one of my favorite views, standing on Palavin’s moon in Mass Effect 3, watching it burn as Reapers descended. It was easier to distance myself from Dragon Age than Mass Effect. Watching Earth fall to the Reaper invasion had been a lot, but Thedas wasn’t Earth, and therefore, I could appreciate what had happened without feeling it personally. I had grown more upset with something happened to my companions than the actually landmarks I adventured through, but now I was looking at the destruction and already I could smell the burning flesh.

            It was real. And it wasn’t going to be possible to distance myself from this.

 

 

            “That is where you walked out of the Fade and our soldiers found you.” Cassandra gestured as we carefully strode through the lines of rubble and burnt corpses. “They say a woman was in the Rift behind you. No one knows who she was.”

            I did, but I wasn’t going to tell them that, thankfully Cassandra didn’t question me and just kept on walking. Varric observed the spot she’d gestured to, but Solas watched me. At least my reactions were genuine. I honestly couldn’t believe my eyes.

            Passing under the crumbling archways that looked as if a breath would knock them over, I followed the Seeker and dwarf into the temple with the mage beside me. I glanced at him sideways. “Did you get to see the Temple before the Breach?” My voice was low, barely a whisper, but Solas heard it.

            “I’ve dreamed here, I know what it looked like, it was a grand place, many souls traveled here to seek healing from the Ashes,” he sighed and looked over at me. I wondered if he was able to see anything around the explosion that destroyed it. If he had, that meant he knew what happened. “Did you ever visit it before?”

            “I heard about it,” I said carefully. “I saw it through the eyes of another.”

            “Who was that?”

            “You won’t believe me,” I smiled and before he could reply, Varric cut in.

            “The Breach _is_ a long way up.”

            I looked up at the Rift before us, then followed the green mist up, tipping my head until it was craned backward, straight up at the Breach that had to be at least a mile high. It dwarfed any airplane that would have passed near it.

            Footsteps behind us made my group spin around defensively, but it was only Leliana and her team. “You’re here. Thank the Maker,” she huffed and jogged up to us.

            Cassandra turned to her, but the rest of us kept our gazes on the Rift at the center of the crater I could tell had once been a building. _I_ knew it was the Temple of Sacred Ashes, and I also knew –sort of– what the layout had been because I was the one who discovered it. Well, I played the Hero of Ferelden –an elf mage I left with the default name because I liked it– who had _actually_ discovered it. Neria had romanced Alistair and kept him in the Wardens instead of one of the alternate endings. I’d played the first game a few different times, but Neria was my favorite playthrough. The second game was a bit more focused, I’d finished it twice, but only with a female mage Hawke, and one playthrough had been for my mother –she wasn’t particularly into this style of gameplay, but she was interested in Inquisition. I told her she had to play the first two games first, but I offered to play through them myself and let her use the save data and make the choices as I did it. This allowed her to work on other things while I fought through the gratuitous violence. My Hawke had romanced Anders, while she had found Fenris more to her liking.

            I was suddenly struck by the wonder of what backstory I had. Who was the Hero of Ferelden? Who was Hawke?

            Cassandra had been speaking to Leliana while my thoughts raced through the past of Thedas bringing us to this moment. So when she appeared in front of me, asking if I was ready, I was startled into a moment of silence.

            Solas seemed to think this was from being intimidated either by the warrior in front of me or the distance to the Breach above us. He stepped forward and gestured to the tear in the sky in front of us. “This Rift is the key. It was the first. Seal it, and perhaps we seal the Breach.”

            “All right,” I sighed, watching my breath crystallize in front of me. I knew it wasn't going to work that simply. I had known that when I played the game for the first time. This was the beginning, one does not simply finish a BioWare game in half an hour and one mission.

            “Then let’s find a way down, and be careful,” Cassandra said, turning away from me. She was the first to start off, and then Solas, but Varric stood there, looking up at me.

            I lifted a brow at the dwarf and he offered a smile. “Just trying to figure you out,” he chuckled and started moving.

            “Did I do something?” I asked, curious what gave him the unique dialogue.

            “You…” he started and narrowed his eyes as if he was searching the rubble for what he wanted to say. “You don’t seem the right kind of surprised.”

            “The ‘right kind of surprised’?” I snorted. This made me nervous, but I needed to play it off.

            Before he could reply, a voice echoed through the crater, stinging my ears. _“This is the hour of our victory…. ”_

            That voice was so much more than in the game.

            _“Bring forth the sacrifice.”_

That time the growl burned from my mark right to my chest. Rather than how the Breach affected it, it felt like fire racing into my heart.

            “What are we hearing?” Cassandra demanded of anyone who would answer.

            I couldn’t, I was stuck staring at the Rift, imagining the game’s parallel scene in severely understated detail. I could see the smoking corpses and smell the burning flesh. I could hear the crackling of fire and taste the ash at the back of my throat. My skin crawled, and the shudder down my spine wasn’t from the cold.

            “At a guess: the person who created the Breach,” Solas answered the Seeker.

            “Come,” she called and Varric nudged me. I realized she was talking to me, a scowl locked on her face.

            “Right,” I marched on after her.

            We didn’t make it far before the red lyrium showed. Like everything else, it looked far better in real life… or whatever I was in right now. The crystals were thick, corrupted things that misted red vapor with an unknown source. The inside looked as though orange sparks crackled along internal fractures. It was as much alive as a plant, and it visibly breathed. Just being this close I could feel the taint of it. It scratched at the back of my head and hissed in my ears.

            “You know this stuff is red lyrium, Seeker,” Varric whispered, eyeing it suspiciously as the warrior led us forward.

            “I see it, Varric,” she said flatly.

            “But what’s it _doing_ here?” he asked, careful to step around the red glass in the ground. I followed suit, knowing full well what happened to people who were in close proximity to the stuff, not to mention those who touched it.

            Solas paused in front of a particularly large stack of the crystals, his grey-blue gaze flicking over the length of it, curious. “Magic could have drawn on lyrium beneath the Temple, corrupted it…”

            “It’s evil. Whatever you do, don’t touch it,” Varric snapped and slapped the elf’s hand when he raised it toward the crystal.

            Solas frowned down at the dwarf but didn’t say anything. I tried not to smile at that. I really wish that would have been a cutscene in the game, it would have made the moment.

            _“Keep the sacrifice still.”_

My mark pulsed, ripping up my arm again with the pitch of the voice. I didn’t remember this from the game at all.

            _“Someone, help me!”_ an accent I knew as Orlesian broke through the air. It sounded French if I was going to relate it to more familiar countries, but in Thedas, it was the accent of the lovely Orlais.

            Cassandra sprinted up to the broken stone railing that would have, potentially, overlooked a large foyer. “That is Divine Justinia’s voice!”

            When no other sounds came from the Rift, she dashed off again, looking for a safe way down. I was pleasantly surprised that there seemed to be no demons here. Then I remembered the Rift was already closed, but not sealed properly, as Solas would soon inform us.

            The Seeker seemed to have forgotten about her party entirely as she ran ahead. I jogged on after her, but I didn’t want to wind myself again. I was weak, and other than the apple, I probably haven’t actually eaten since coming to Thedas, and it was hard telling how long that was. They probably gave me water in my sleep and maybe something with protein to keep me well, but I couldn’t have been getting a good meal while unconscious. This whole day was wearing on me though, and I could feel my joints preparing to give out. I hated how out of shape I was. I always meant to work out, but I just couldn’t get myself up.

            Well, I didn’t think that would be a problem anymore.

            My mark pulsed and shook my hand as I drew closer and closer to the Rift. I lifted it to see the spiraling green light dance around my fingers. It was beautiful when I ignored how much it _burned._

            _“Someone, help me!”_ Divine Justinia cried again. It was a replay I was pretty sure, but Cassandra’s reaction was one of a guard to their charge. She threw herself from a landing that no longer had its railings.

            _“What’s going on here?”_

            I froze at the edge of landing and stiffened at the sound of my voice. I looked up and shifted, totally bewildered. It was worse than hearing a recording of myself, it was distorted like it was pushing through a filter –the Fade– and echoed in the crater around us. Solas and Varric both looked at me and Cassandra spun around, her eyes wet.

            “That was your voice. Most Holy called out to you. But…” her brows curved upward.

            I sat down on the ledge, preferring to drop down instead of jump. I wasn’t as skilled as they were. If I landed wrong I could break something, and I didn’t particularly want to use another one of Cassandra’s potions.

            The Rift flashed and the scene around us changed. The ruins were overlapped by phantom shadows of what was here before, but they flickered in and out. Shadows took the places of what had been Justinia and me, more like what Corypheus was. Only his eyes shone through, small burning lights in the unnatural shadow.

            _“Run while you can! Warn them!”_ Justinia cried out, her voice broken with distress.

            _“We have an intruder. Slay the human!”_ Corypheus snarled and causing my mark to blaze again, shooting up my arm into my chest. I hissed and looked away as the phantom projection gestured to the shadow that was me.

            How did this happen? I didn’t wake up there, I woke up at the beginning of the game and _this_ was before the game. It was explored further later. Unless… unless I forgot it like my character did in the game.

            Oh _shit._

            “You _were_ there!” Cassandra grabbed the collar of my shirt and pulled me to better face her. “Who attacked? And the Divine, is she…? Was this vision true?” Her voice was loud, high, and unrelenting. “What are we seeing?”

            “I don’t remember that,” I yelped and held my hands up, dropping the sword I’d been carrying in favor of surrender. I hated upsetting people, and I’d always liked Cassandra. I didn’t know what to do now, she was pissed and I couldn’t really help the situation by spilling out the truth.

            Or… maybe it could?

            “I, it’s –that’s Corypheus,” I spat out and then clamped my mouth shut.

            Cassandra’s expression relaxed from anger into confusion. The name meant nothing to her, but Varric and Solas both jerked to look at me.

            “Did you just say–?” Varric started but Solas twirled his staff and then gestured to the Rift.

            “Echoes of what happened here. The Fade bleeds into this place.”

            Varric and Cassandra ignored him. The Seeker shook me. “You lied to me?”

            “Listen,” I breathed and grabbed her wrists, failing in my attempt to get her to loosen her grip on me. “Cassandra, I can’t explain everything. But what I can doesn’t make sense right now.”

            “Tell me,” she screamed into my face and bit my lip. I regretted this.

            Varric didn’t come to my aid. I could feel his stare on me, but I didn’t dare look away from the woman in front of me. “Corypheus, he’s a… darkspawn? Or something, I don’t know. He was a Magister from Tevinter and one of the original darkspawn I think? He went into the Golden City and–”

            “Impossible,” Cassandra threw me away from her in disgust and I hit the ground, hard. Ignoring the pain in my ass, I stood back up and finally risked a look at Varric.

            The dwarf was staring up at the Rift, but the vision was gone, the shadows vanished and they weren’t coming back. He seemed to be thinking, maybe trying to decide if I was right or not.

            Solas came to my rescue again, though. “This Rift is not sealed, but it is closed… albeit temporarily.” Cassandra spun around to turn her glare on him but he remained unfazed. “I believe that with the mark, the Rift can be opened and then sealed properly and safely.” His expression darkened. “However, opening the Rift will likely attract attention from the other side.”

            Cassandra’s whole body screamed confliction. She kept her back to me now and addressed everyone else. I imagined a white notification in the corner of my display say _Cassandra Greatly Disapproved_. She yelled out the order for everyone, “That means demons. Stand ready.”

            As the Inquisition soldiers started circling, I made my way past her and stood in front of the Rift, beside Solas. The elf was looking at me with a careful mask schooling his expression. I wet my lips and started nibbling on the lower one, breaking through a few layers of skin.

            “Varric will want to know how you knew about Corypheus,” he said softly, enough I barely heard him and his voice wouldn’t carry over the bustle of movement around us.

            “And you don’t?” I asked, looking at him now. My brows drew together and he copied the expression, tilting his chin up so he looked down his nose at me just slightly.

            “I have a theory.”

            “Of course you do,” I breathed and looked back, noting the nod from Cassandra to one of the soldiers. Then she turned to me and inclined her head.

            I faced the Rift and lifted the shining mark. It was already like holding my hand up to a fire, but when I got it in position and concentrated on the feeling, a beam linked my palm to the center mass. The Rift looked like crystalized sky, fracturing and jerking back and forth. I imagined it was like an inside-out ice cube that’s started to crack. Instead of water, it was air. Green and black fog and mist circled it, with rays of bending light streaming down from the Breach above. It wasn’t pretty; it was terrifyingly sublime. A force that I wouldn’t want anything to do with if it hadn’t been for the mark on my hand. Even having played the game most of the way through, I didn’t feel as if I was prepared for this.

           But who ever is?

            The Rift pulsed, the jagged cracks in the air jerked out, spasm. A shock rippled through the air and something shot out of the hole in the sky. I knew what that something was before it impacted the ground and threw some soldiers off of their feet.

            Cassandra and Varric staggered, but Solas leaped forward, staff striking the ground as he brought down a heavy lightning strike on the pride demon. The beast roared, its body bending back and all the muscles in its thick form tensed. I was pretty sure this particular kind of demon had a strong defense against lightning, but I didn’t say anything to the elf.

            Towering at least twenty feet in the air, the demon moved with surprising speed. Turning its head this way and that as arrows pelted it and soldiers rushed its legs. The horns on its head had to be the length of an average human, and they weren’t the smooth, simple looking things seen in the game. Instead, they were like branches, twisting and tangling. Its body was covered in layered plates right on exposed muscle. The whole of it had a purple hue, accented with black horns and bone showing through. Even its seven eyes were black, looking more like pits than balls.

            This fight I hadn’t been looking forward to, and for good reason.

            The pride demon was the first to come through, but not the only. And because this wasn’t a game, we didn’t have waves of enemies, just a random flow. One I was very close to.

            Something pushed me out of the way and I realized too late I was about to get swiped by a shade. Man, I had decent situational awareness, but exhaustion and the aching of my body had done away with that.

            Cassandra threw her sword into the face of the shade that had tried to grab me. “Watch yourself,” she barked and threw her shield into another, knocking its solid form back.

            I stood and busied myself with the Rift, trying to get it closed ASAP because that was the most good I was to them right now. It was the only thing I could do.

            It meant I missed the fight. I didn’t get to watch them bring down the pride demon. I didn’t get to see the massacre of shades and lesser demons. I didn’t get to see Casandra, Varric, or Solas’ faces as I closed the Rift in on itself. Sealing it.

            But I did get to watch the Rift fold inward, stitch itself up, and then send up a shock to the Breach.

            The tremor shook the sky and then blew up the air.

            The flash was so bright I thought I’d go blind.

            And everything went black, again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second chapter done! Woot, lemme know what y'all think. I wasn't expecting Cassandra to get sooooo pissed, and I REALLY didn't think Christi was going to offer up the spoiler so fast. Damn, wonder how she'll fix that. We'll have to see!


	3. Today I Went To Therapy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are different, but it's still the game we know and love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today I Went To Therapy  
> ~Game Over, Falling in Reverse

            When I came to, I was on my back with my mouth hanging open, the worst headache of my life splintering the back of my eyes. I snapped my lips shut and flicked my dry tongue around, trying to wet the space as best I could as I shifted in my sheets and flung an arm over my head. Had I been drinking? Was this a hangover? I’d never had one before so I wasn’t sure what they were supposed to feel like.

            I did know what my bed was supposed to feel like, and this wasn’t it, it wasn’t the normal stiff mattress from my apartment I was used to. In fact, it was more like the feather bed I had back at my parents’ house.

            And then I remembered what I had been dreaming about and my eyes snapped open.

            Instead of eggshell walls and a popcorn ceiling, I was staring at a wood and thatched roof. Instead of a ceiling fan with my dream catcher handing from one of the fan pull chain, there was a chandelier with lit candles. Instead of blinds in front of my windows, I saw right out into the snow-covered village of Haven.

            “Oh no,” I breathed and sat up slowly, blinking several times. My head pulsed despite the delicate movement, and my stomach protested. Apparently, I was hungry, but that wasn’t much of a shock. I’d probably been in Thedas a week now, if I gave a couple of days for me being out like a light –Candle? Out like a candle– twice now.

            The room was bigger in the game than what I was looking at now. Or maybe it was because everything was proportioned better? I couldn’t be sure. Either way, when I stood up and stumbled over to the table to look at the papers there, I learned I couldn’t read the language.

            “Fuck,” I whispered and realized what had happened. They spoke English, sure, but they didn’t have the English alphabet. Instead, they had something that looked sort of Asian at first glance, maybe Greek. Either way, it was unfamiliar, and I didn’t have the know how to read any of Adan’s notes.

            Tossing the papers down I sighed and dressed in my dirty clothes before walking over to the door. In the game, after waking up, an elf was supposed to come in with some supplies, but so far I was alone. Trying the door, I found it locked from the outside.

            A frown pulled my lips down and I tried it again, just to make sure. When it didn’t budge, I huffed and turned back to the room. Furs were pinned up on the walls, antlers and horns were mounted to boards, and artwork made from knitted, stitched, or other kinds of cloth decorated the space, giving it a homey feel, but I wanted to know where I was to go next.

            I was more than comfortable with this when I knew what was going to happen, but I started to pace as my thoughts drifted.

            Why would they lock me up? It had to be because of what I told Cassandra. They knew more than they should at this point, and it’s caused them to act differently.

            Hell, what else changed just because I told them too much?

            Oh shit, what did Cassandra think of me now that she knew I knew what happened– sort of?

            She’d already been suspicious of the player character, but the Temple was supposed to remedy that. Afterward, she and the player were friends –sort of, and depending on your choices. I’d never had a problem getting along with her. Of course, I’d do something she disapproved of now and again, but that was natural. She never hated me, but I was sure she did now.

            I was just considering how to get through the window when I heard a board across the door move and the threshold fell open, letting in a rush of cold air. I spun around and stared at the guards tracking snow in. The one in the front was familiar to me, but mostly for the armor he wore, not his face.

            Cullen Rutherford, the Inquisition’s Commander. He was dressed in his red-cloaked armor, the thick fur draped across his shoulders like a lion’s mane –suitable for the nickname he’d been given. His expression was that of irritation and annoyance, twisting his handsome features so that his brows were drawn together over his honey eyes. His blonde hair was tinted with red, and darker than Inquisition had let on; looking more like it may have in the first game. He was also more scarred. It was a good mix between the single scar the game developers had given him and the amount one of the mods I used did. Old burns had healed along the left side of his face, barely reaching his eye, but the hair on that side was noticeably thinned.

            I could tell it was him though, and I noticed too late I was staring at him, causing that annoyed expression to darken more.

            “I am Commander Rutherford,” he introduced himself and then nodded to one of the guards flanking him. “We’re bringing you to the Chantry.”

            “Armed guards?” I breathed and eyed the woman coming my way. She had cuffs in one hand and the other rested on the sword beside her. “Is that really necessary? I’m sure Cassandra and Solas told you I’m no trouble.”

            “Quite the opposite, actually,” Cullen stated and gestured to the cuffs. I was immediately reminded of the beginning of this and wondered if they were the same chains I’d been locked up in before. “If you make one wrong move, you’ll be chained and tossed in the dungeons.” Honestly, I was surprised I wasn’t there already. “The Seeker made me aware of what happened at the Temple. You’ve not been completely honest with us.”

            Ouch. I winced at that and looked up at the former Templar. He was beautiful. More than the game could give him, his features rested on him better, and I could place each of the gentle differences. He even seemed a little taller, maybe just over six foot. The Templars knew how to grow their soldiers. “Yeah, that’s… hard to explain,” I admitted, but the Commander didn’t look the least bit sympathetic. I respected that. At thirty, he’d had to deal with a lot of bullshit up to this point, and I didn’t think I was going to help at all.

            “You’ll have the chance to try,” he turned sharply on his heels and the cloak over his armor snapped. “Follow me.”

            I resisted saying something like ‘with pleasure’ because I knew that wouldn’t help.

            What came next was, surprisingly, similar to the game. The crowd was there, and they were being kept parted to make a path to the Chantry with Inquisition guards blocking them. Instead of the guards standing with fists over their hearts in salute, they were more actively keeping the villagers back, and were barely able to acknowledge Cullen as he passed. The people were pretty forthcoming with conversation though.

            “That’s her. That’s the Herald of Andraste…”

            “They said when she came out of the Fade, Andraste herself was watching over her.”

            “Hush. We shouldn’t disturb her.”

            The Commander kept the march through the village brisk, and I realized quickly just how exhausted I was. No food, little water, and days of lying around unconscious weren’t good for the body, especially one as out of shape as mine. When we reached the stairs I stumbled, and before one of the guards could grab me, a friendly shoulder slipped under my arm.

            I looked over at Varric, my brows skewed in confusion.

            “Hey there,” he grinned and then waved off one of the guards when they came closer. “I got her, don’t worry, I doubt she'd have the strength to choke me if she wanted to.”

            It was true, and Cullen seemed to realize this too as he looked us over. I tried to stand up straighter, but Varric barely stood to my ribs and he was most of the strength keeping me vertical at this point. “You, get some water, and bread with cheese,” the Commander nodded to someone and footsteps left us. “When was the last time you ate?”

            “I don’t remember,” I said honestly. It could have been the dinner I ate before preparing for bed –cheap mac ‘n cheese with cheaper hotdogs chopped up into it. That would have been before I came to Thedas. Or it could have been something _here_ I just couldn’t remember. That thought startled me.

            Cullen came to my side and took me from the dwarf. One of his soldiers copied on my other side. It was _then_ that I realized the smell of sweat and _body_ wasn’t completely mine. I figured the lack of showering companied with running around had done a number on me. This was probably a week without bathing for me, and that meant I wasn’t going to be the best smelling person around. I wasn’t completely shocked to find that I could actually smell it and no one seemed to notice, but I was stunned for a moment that not only the soldier but also Cullen, stank just as I did.

            Nobody likes to admit just how gross things got without indoor plumbing. We want to romanticize the past: knights in shining armor, with wavy hair and perfect teeth… but that’s not realistic. Cullen was probably the closest thing I would find to that image here, and despite how much more put together he seemed than the other soldier, I could easily pick out the thick scent of sweat from him.

            The trip to the Chantry was longer than in the game, like everything was, but when we got there I realized just how cold it was outside. Between the bodies I hadn’t really noticed, but now the fires warmed me up and I sighed. Varric closed the door behind us, and the soldier pulled away from me. Cullen shifted me to accommodate the absence, and we continued forward. Varric hovered, watching for if I needed another arm.

            “I’m sorry,” I found myself saying. I couldn’t look at Cullen anymore, or Varric for that matter. Everything about the situation was embarrassing and I was utterly disgusted with myself for not being stronger.

            “What for?” Cullen answered, his tone wasn’t harsh, simply surprised.

            “Everything,” I answered. Then the rambling started, “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, I don’t even know really _what_ went on at the Conclave. Was I there? Did I enter the Fade somewhere else and just happen here?” I cut off my words immediately and shook my head, “We heard my voice with Corypheus at the Temple; I spoke to the Divine before she died, but I don’t remember it. I remember falling into the Fade,” I looked up at the Commander, my mind racing beyond trying to relate this game to real life, now I was focused on actually living it. “I remember climbing the steps to the woman to escape the fear demons, I remember falling out of the Fade and waking up in the Chantry’s prison.”

            Cullen’s brows were drawn together as he searched my face. I knew he was looking for any sign of a lie or mistruth, anything that didn’t line up. And he found one. “You know who killed the Divine.”

            The simple statement wrenched my heart and I nodded once. I could feel Varric’s eyes on me as well. “I… I know that because I know some of the future.”

            This caught his attention and he stiffened, his grip on me loosening. “How?”

            “I’ve seen it,” I said and shrugged. “At least one version of what could happen. I’m not sure what it will really be like.”

            “With magic?” he tried to rationalize it.

            “I’m no mage, but that’s as good an explanation as any,” I smiled awkwardly. At least he didn’t jump to demons. That was my biggest fear.

            Cullen brought me over to a chair near the door leading into the room the Inquisition was using for strategy and planning. I could hear Cassandra and the Chancellor at each other's throats.

            “Have you gone completely mad?” he yelled at her. “She is a danger to us all and you don’t even have her imprisoned. She should be taken to Val Royeaux immediately, to be tried by whomever becomes Divine.”

            “I do not believe she is guilty,” Cassandra replied.

            That warmed me as I sat down and waited for the Commander to bring me into the war room. If it was even called that yet. Varric came to my side, looking me over with friendly worry. I knew questions burned the inside of his mouth, but I also appreciated him waiting to ask them.

            The soldier with the requested water and bread arrived, stopping in front of me to offer the flagon. Varric took it from her and she left. “Just tip your head back,” he said and lifted the water. I smiled at him gratefully.

            Following the instruction, I looked up and opened my mouth. The water was warm, it had probably been over a fire previously and cooled on the way here. I didn’t much care because it soothed the burning in my throat and I gulped it down as quickly as he poured it. I ignored whatever Cullen was doing because I couldn’t bear the thought of _knowing_ he saw me acted like a starved prisoner.

            Well, I was one, sort of, maybe, but that wasn’t the point. I didn’t like being this way, and it made me feel a bit better to simply focus on the soothing water coming down to me.

            It stopped too soon, and the dwarf offered me the bread with slices of pale cheese. I didn’t care what kind it was because it was _food_ , and I immediately took the slice and started nibbling away. If I ate and drank too fast I would throw up, it wasn’t a matter of if I wanted to, it just simply happened. 

            “The prisoner failed, Seeker. The Breach is still in the sky. For all you know, she intended it this way,” the Chancellor continued as I ate, his voice earnest: he believed his words.

            I peeked at Cullen then, because he was trying very hard to look like he wasn’t listening. His gentling pacing told me he was stressed, though, and then there was the familiar way his hand lifted to rub at the back of his neck before ruffling his hair. I smiled a little at that and kept my mouth full of the cool bread and cheese.

            “I do not believe that–” Cassandra broke in, but she was cut off.

            “That is not for you to decide. Your duty is to serve the Chantry.”

            “My duty is to serve the principles on which the Chantry was founded, Chancellor. As is yours,” the hiss added at the end was finalizing.

            Cullen sighed and rubbed his forehead then. I was suddenly reminded of his fight with lyrium withdrawal and I wondered at what point he stopped taking it exactly. It wasn't discussed until later –much later– in the game, but I wondered how long he’s been off of it. Since the end of the second game? That wasn’t that long ago, but it had to be at least a month, right?

            I turned to Varric who blinked and met my gaze. “Something I can do for you, Dreamer?”

            My lips quirked at that, “Dreamer?”

            “I give everyone nicknames, and you act like you’ve been walking through a dream the whole time I’ve known you.”

            “I like it,” I said and shifted in my seat, taking a small bite of the bread. It wasn’t the best I’d had in my life, but it was homemade, and definitely not bleached white bread. “What can you tell me about Hawke? I know you write…?” I tried to be subtle, but Varric just smiled.

            “Hawke? She’s a great woman. A mage,” he rolled his shoulders and I took the platter of food from him. “She and Anders–”

            The door to the war room flew open and the Chancellor stepped out, fuming. As soon as he saw me sitting in my chair, his face turned as red as the accents on his robes. He spun around, looking for a guard, and eyed Cullen. “You, chain her. I want her prepared for travel to the capital for trial.”

            The Commander’s strawberry blonde brows rose at the gall of the clerk, but Cassandra marched out of the room. “Disregard that–” she started and realized it was Cullen who hadn’t moved to obey. A smirk quirked her lips and then she looked at me. “Come here.”

            I stood and stepped around Roderick. He was a couple of inches shorter than me and didn’t seem to like that. Cullen followed me into the room, but Varric stayed back. I glanced at him as the Chancellor spun on his heels to accompany me into the room as well.

            Leliana was on the other side of the table, purple robes just the same as I’d seen her in before, but now her hood was off. Her hair hadn’t changed much since the first game, still cropped at her chin with troublesome locks braided away from her face.

            “You walk a dangerous line, Seeker,” Roderick seethed, circling the table, opposite Cassandra, so they stood at either end.

            “The Breach is stable, but it is still a threat.” She placed her hands on the table and glared across the room at him. “I will not ignore it.”

            Cullen crossed his arms, “Is she still a suspect?”

            “She most certainly is,” Roderick started, shooting daggers at the Commander.

            “Not,” Cassandra added. “No, she is not.”

            Leliana cut in then, “Someone was behind the explosion at the Conclave. Someone Most Holy did no expect.” Her gaze flicked to Roderick, carefully neutral. “Perhaps they died with the others –or have allies who yet live.” Her blue eyes rolled over to me then. “You said you knew who it was.”

            I expected Cullen to interject then, but he stayed quiet. I tried not to look his way. “That’s right.”

            “She admits to it,” Roderick exclaimed and threw his hands toward me.

            “She admits to knowing the one responsible,” Cullen corrected then, straightening up so he stood in the line of sight between the Chancellor and me.

            “And how would she know that without being in league with them?” his skeptical eyes narrowed, but he didn’t dare approach the armed Commander between us –no matter how low the actual likelihood of Cullen attacking him was.

            “I heard the voices in the Temple. The Divine called to her for help, and this…” Cassandra glanced to me.

            “Corypheus,” I supplied.

            “Corypheus,” she nodded, and glared at Roderick, “Ordered her death.”

            “So her survival, that _thing_ on her hand ­–all a coincidence?” he folded his arms, lifting his chin in a manner that allowed him to look down his nose at us.

            “Providence,” Cassandra corrected. “The Maker sent her to us in our darkest hour. I will not pretend she was not exactly what we needed when we needed it.”

            All eyes settled on me and I tried not to squirm. “Blessed be the Maker,” I managed. I had faith in my world, and I’d always favored the Chantry in the Dragon Age games, so my characters did as well. In a room full of Andrastians, it wouldn’t have befitted me to shove their religion in their face anyway. I had a feeling that the approval system wasn’t limited to companions anymore, and Leliana wasn’t somebody I wanted to piss off. Not to mention Cullen....

            The Commander looked at me sideways, I could feel his attention more than see it, and tried to suck in my stomach without looking like I was. My cheeks flushed, but thankfully Leliana was speaking.

            Cassandra turned her back on us, going to the back of the room as Leliana demanded the attention of the room. “The Breach remains, and your mark is still our only hope of closing it.”

            “This is _not_ for you to decide,” Roderick growled. His eyes kept flicking to Cullen. The Commander was relaxed, both hands resting on the pommel of his sword as it was positioned comfortably high at his side. I knew his posture was one of comfortable rest, but the Chancellor saw it as threatening.

            It was then that Cassandra returned to the table, close to Roderick, daring him to make a move. He flinched when she slammed a thick book down on the table in front of him and pointed a gloved hand at it. “You know what this is, Chancellor.” It wasn’t a question, she continued anyway, for those of us –me– in the room who wouldn't know. “A writ from the Divine, granting us the authority to act. As of this moment, I declare the Inquisition _officially_ reborn.”

            Ah, there it is. They’d been building forces for the Inquisition, but they weren’t _actually_ named so until now.

            Roderick backed away from Cassandra, but she pursued him, making each word clear to him. “We will close the Breach, we will find those responsible, and we will restore order. With or without your approval.” Her gloved finger bounced off his chest. I briefly considered how that could be considered assault, but hey, times are different, and the Chancellor’s twisted expression wasn’t at the contact so much as the words.

            Roderick’s narrowed eyes flicked from Cassandra to me, then paused briefly on Cullen and Leliana. He was gravely outnumbered in the room, and he knew it. So he did the only thing he could, and left, shaking his head as if he felt sorry for us.

            Cassandra stood tall while he departed, but she quickly relaxed into an exhausted posture and rustled the hair at the back of her head when the door shut. She didn’t look at any of us as she took in what had just happened.

            Leliana stepped forward and ran her fingers over the heavy book, her gloves whispering against the leather. “This is the Divine’s directive: rebuild the Inquisition of old.” She was speaking to me, I could tell, but she wouldn’t look away from the thick tome. “Find those who will stand against the chaos.” Then the redhead stepped up to Cassandra’s side and looked the other woman in the eye. “We aren’t ready.” She looked to me, and then Cullen. “We have no leader, no numbers, and now no chantry support.”

            Cassandra tipped her chin up, “But we have no choice: we must act now. With you at our side.” Her brown eyes fell on me and I shifted under the attention.

            “I’ll do anything I can,” I swore. Cullen shifted at my side, and I caught the smile curving the corner of his lips.

            “Help us fix this before it’s too late,” Cassandra offered her hand up to me and I immediately took it, giving it a strong shake.

            “Anything you need.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> School's kicking my ass so I've not been able to work on personal writing much and I wanted to sneak this in while I had the chance


	4. Told Him My Embarrassing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christi takes the next step to save Thedas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Told Him My Embarrassing   
> ~Game Over, Falling in Reverse

            Seven days in Thedas. It was a lot different than the game at this point. When things got boring there was a time skip or montage, but this was like real life. You had to sit through all the boring pieces.

            And by you, I mean me.

            It wasn’t all bad, but I had nothing to do. No one trusted me to help with much of anything, I couldn’t read the language so books were out of the question, and every time I woke up I thought I was back home before being reminded I very much wasn’t. It would have been completely unbearable if it hadn’t been for Solas and Varric. And when I wasn’t spending time with them, I was trying to get better at fighting.

            Training was an embarrassing process that I didn’t like other people seeing, so I went off into the woods outside Haven to the north, where there was a cabin and a logging site in game. Finding the cabin was easy enough, it was right down a path, but the logging site, which was where I really wanted to train, was another story.

            After two days of trekking through the woods, I still hadn’t found the damn thing. Cassandra was starting to get quite irritated with my sneaking off. It made me feel bad, but I also didn’t like how she treated me like a child. I told her I wanted to learn how to defend myself and she told me that I didn’t need any more than I had because I had her, Varric, and Solas to guard me whenever we went out into the world. And in Haven, I was as safe as I could be.

            I snuck out anyway.

            I found the snowy adventure relaxing. It helped ease myself into the situation I was in. Being around the Inquisition’s team was like being tossed naked into a pool of ice water. The only upside was I was no doubt losing weight.

            I sighed as I shuffled through the high snow. I’d gotten some socks to wear so the blisters on my heels would go away, but they soaked up the cold water from melting snow. I would head back soon. Until I got better boots –which Cassandra said I would get when I actually needed them– I couldn’t be out here for more than an hour.

            I turned back before I found the logging site, again, and tried to busy my mind with thoughts about my surroundings, not of home. Anytime I thought of home I only depressed myself.

            I didn’t want to question if the same amount of time passed here as did in my world, and if it did, what I was missing. Who was missing me. My roommates no doubt thought something happened to me. My parents were probably spamming my phone. I never went a day without replying, let alone a week. My mother was getting ready to deploy, and I was lost in one of my favorite video games….

            “Herald.”

            I jumped at the voice in the quiet and grabbed my chest, trying to slow my heart. Cullen was standing a few yards ahead on the path in front of the cabin. I hadn’t realized I’d made it back this far.

            “Oh, Commander,” I said and cleared my throat, trying to look casual. “Is there something I can do for you?”

            “Cassandra was looking for you,” he said and I noticed how his golden eyes drifted to my boots. “She seemed sure you weren’t out here.”

            “Well,” I stopped walking once I was in front of him and shrugged. “I guess she doesn’t know me that well.”

            “Why _are_ you out here?” he shifted, hand on the pommel of his sword. It wasn’t a threat, it was his relaxed position. He didn’t fear I’d attack him. “There’s nothing here.”

            “I like that. It helps me… relax. And I’ve been,” I shifted, grabbing my own sword to mimic his posture, but it wasn’t as natural. He had to notice, but he didn’t bring attention to it. “I’ve been practicing. I don’t like being defenseless.”

            The Commander nodded and lifted his brows. “You can train with the other soldiers…”

            “I,” my cheeks flushed and I had to look away from him. I’d wanted to avoid actually saying the words aloud. “I would be an embarrassment.”

            “There are plenty of new recruits who have never wielded a sword,” Cullen offered, his voice soft. “There is no shame in it.”

            “You’ve not seen my sword work,” I smiled and shook my head, unwilling to say more.

            Cullen stepped back and pulled his blade free. I knew exactly what he was doing, and I continued to shake my head.

            “Oh, please don’t,” I couldn’t help but smile at the look on his face. He was grinning also, but in a daring way.

            “Come on, then, Harold, show me how bad you are,” he waved his sword in a manner to gesture to my own blade. His was longer, heavier, and a far _better_ weapon than mine, but I knew a sword was a sword, and just because his was prettier, didn’t mean mine couldn’t do the job.

            I pulled out my sword and tried to copy his stance. He, of course, stood naturally, and I struggled to keep the position. Cullen came toward me a step and I backed up, losing whatever posture I had, and he knocked his blade against mine. The smack of metal vibrated down my arm and I gripped the handle tighter.

            “Turn more, keep your feet apart. Relax, you’re over thinking it,” he instructed and lifted his other arm. “If you have a shield you’d hold your arm like this, since you don’t: like this.” I copied and tried to keep my breathing even as I adjusted my feet and torso to his instruction.

            This time when he came forward I didn’t stumble. Instead, I just held my ground and he moved around my blade like it wasn’t even there. The flat of his blade swatted my upper arm and I ended up retreating back a few steps. The strike didn’t hurt, and my shirt’s sleeves kept it from stinging, but we both knew it wasn’t meant to hurt. It simply showed the threat of someone trying to kill me being able to get by me.

            Of course, the situation was very different. I knew Cullen wasn’t trying to kill me, and I was _very_ distracted by my favorite love interest’s presence in general. Had he been someone whom I didn’t know from the game I probably would have responded better. Or at least, more naturally. Now I was desperately seeking his approval as well as to keep from embarrassing myself in front of him.

            “I told you, there is no shame.” He smiled and sheathed his sword, ending the session.

            “We’re doing this one on one, it’s a little easier for me to learn when I’m not focused on keeping up with everyone else.” I put away my sword and brushed my hair out of my face. My bangs were getting long before I came here, now they seemed to remind me I never got the haircut I wanted to. Cullen waved toward the path, inviting me to lead the way and I did. He walked beside me and we continued to speak.

            “If you would prefer to learn out here,” he looked at the trees thoughtfully. “I can assist you. I also learn better in one on one training sessions.”

            “Is that how you became the best Templar ever?” I asked with a grin and looked up at him. To my surprise, his cheeks flushed and he coughed, choking on his breath.

            “Best? Ever?” he looked at me with lifted brows. “Where ever did you get that idea?”

            I laughed and rolled my shoulders. “You’re Commander of the Inquisition, you have to be the best.”

            “I am not, but thank you, Herald.”

            “Please, Christi is fine,” I said and looked up at him again. “Where I come from Harold is an old man’s name.”

            “I apologize,” he tipped his head and my cheeks warmed.

            Jeez. I looked on ahead and saw the camp. With Cassandra standing in front, foot tapping and arms crossed. “Oops, looks like I’m in trouble.”

            “Do not worry, she will not hurt you,” Cullen said but took a step in front of me as we reached the Seeker. With the Commander between us, I felt a little safer, but the steel in the woman’s eyes told me she was more than pissed.

            “Now that you have graced us with your presence, I have news. We’re needed in the Hinterlands to speak with Mother Giselle. There is also the matter of horses for the Inquisition.” Cassandra started walking toward the gates of Haven and I followed, glancing back to make sure Cullen was coming. He kept in stride with me, though, allowing me to relax.

            I hated that I had such a crush on him, it made this whole thing so… weird. I knew him far better than he knew me, and it influenced the relationship, and based on how my knowledge had worked out so far, I didn’t think it would lend for a healthy, happy relationship.

            Besides, he, as real as he appeared now, was a video game character. It made for a very strange mix of feelings as to whether or not it was healthy for _me_ to have such an attraction to him. Sure I liked him, but I also knew he wasn’t real. I didn’t sit in my room and pine over him, or dream of meeting him like this. I looked for a real boyfriend, I just never found one worth his salt.

            Now the universe just tosses me into this situation and acts like it’s no big deal.

            I realized now that Cassandra was speaking and I’d missed some of what she said.

            “…to speak to either, so in the meantime, we have to bolster the Inquisition’s influence.” She stopped in front of Varric’s campfire. The dwarf stood from where he’d been scribbling on a stack of papers.

            “We going somewhere, Seeker?”

            “The Hinterlands,” she answered and gestured up the road. “Tell Solas to prepare.”

            “On it,” Varric nodded and headed off.

            Cassandra turned to me. “Is there anything you need before we go?”

            I let out a long breath and put my hands on my hips, thinking. “I mean… I don’t really have… armor or anything.”

            “I’ll take her to the smith, he should have a set ready for her,” Cullen said. Cassandra nodded.

            “We’ll meet you at the stables when we’re ready.”

            I watched her march off and I turned back to the Commander. “I have a set of armor?”

            “Yes,” he started back down the way we’d come. “The Herald of Andraste should have a suit of armor befit her title, don’t you think?”

            “Will it be anything like yours?” I asked with a grin and gestured to the fur on his shoulders and the cape down his sides.

            He chuckled, but the sound was accompanied by rosy cheeks. Man, the game didn’t do his blush credit, he was way too easy to tease. “Not that I’ve seen. It is simple, until you know how you prefer to fight, we wanted something that would suit multiple styles. Once you get the hang of fighting, we can make you another set that is… better.”

            We stopped outside the stables that also acted as the smithy. Harritt was lecturing a young elf about leaving tools too close to the forge, but quickly composed himself when he saw us.

            “Ah, Commander, Harold, here for your armor?” he asked and started walking toward the rack that had a full set of chain and plate mail hanging from it. It was a hefty looking thing, and I knew right away I was going to get a work out just from wearing it.

            “Yes,” Cullen gestured to it. “Is it ready?”

            “Of course.”

            I wasn’t, but that didn’t seem to concern the men. Instead, I went with an elf into the smithy to change into the armor. I came back out feeling well over three hundred pounds and slow. I looked down at myself and then at Cullen.

            “Well?” I put my hands on my hips and tried not to look worn out. “How’s it look?”

            “It’ll do,” he said and stepped closer. “You may want to do something with your hair. If it catches in the mail…” he frowned and I bit my lip at the image.

            “Good point. All right,” I looked at the elf and she supplied me with a string to tie it back. “Thank you,” I said and started to bunch my hair at the nape of my neck. Herritt gave me an approving once-over as I struggled to contain my hair.

            “How’s your range of motion? Does it fit good?” the smithy asked.

            “I’ve never worn armor before, but it… fits,” I tried.

            The smith sighed and rubbed his forehead. “Of course it does. I made it.”

            Cullen snorted and came around behind me, “May I?” I let go of my hair and watched Herritt head off toward the forge.

            “Thanks for the help, Commander.”

            “Cullen is fine,” he replied. He ran his fingers through my hair, combing it together before twisting it into a braid.

            “You know a lot about hair?” I asked, trying not to move. Cullen Rutherford was braiding my hair….

            “I have sisters,” he chuckled. “One older and one younger. I got very good at this. I may be out of practice… but this will do,” he tied it up off my collar and came back around to stand in front of me. “It should allow you to wear your helmet as well.” I pulled the headgear on and found the hair didn’t inhibit it at all.

            “Thank you,” I smiled and he tipped his head forward in acknowledgment.

            Before we could say more, Cassandra approached with Solas and Varric in stride.

            “Are you ready, Harold?” the Seeker asked and looked me over. I nodded and she gestured to the stables. “We have a horse for you, a gift from a noble family looking to support the Inquisition.”

            “Oh? I didn’t hear anything about that,” I grinned.

            “It was to be a surprise.”

            I followed her to the stall and smiled up at the mare. She was black and white in a fashion that made it hard to tell if she had speckled black spots or white ones. “Does she have a name?” I turned back to Cassandra with a wide smile. I’d always loved horses and to have my own was… amazing.

            “Yes, Pepper.”

            I smirked and turned back to her, reaching out to brush my fingers over her velvet nose. She pressed into my palm and snorted. I whispered, “You’re Dr Pepper now.” It was one of the things I missed from my world, and I’d be damned if I’d miss the chance to name my first horse after my favorite soft drink.

            Cassandra walked off to do something and Varric followed, but Solas kept close, blue-grey eyes rolling over Pepper’s face. “She’s a beautiful steed,” he complimented.

            “She is,” I agreed and then glanced at Cullen. “Is that tack for me as well?” I nodded to a nearby saddle and gear. It was dark leather with red accents, marked with the Inquisition’s insignia.

            “Yes,” the Commander accompanied me to it. “Have you ever ridden a horse?”

            “It’s been years,” I breathed and gestured to the tack. “I’ve never done this part though.”

            “I can help her, Commander,” Solas said suddenly. We both looked back at him, curious at his addition. “Leliana mentioned needing to speak with you. Josephine and she had a meeting you missed.”

            “Ah, yes,” Cullen looked at me. “I was looking for you.”

            “Oh, I’m sorry,” I flushed, crossing my arms.

            “It is all right,” he stepped away and rubbed the back of his neck. “I should see what they need. Safe travels, Herald,” he said, clearing his throat. “If you need anything, I am a raven away.”

            “Thanks,” I breathed, watching him leave. Solas also watched, but his expression was indifferent. “Know much about horses?” I asked and the elf turned his attention back to me.

            He offered up a smile and nodded once, hands pinned behind his back as he looked at Pepper. “You could say that. My people have always had better connections to animals than humans.”

            “Ouch,” I chuckled and turned to the tack.

            “I did not mean offense.” Solas came up to my side and I nodded.

            “I know,” I comforted him, a hand on his shoulder. “But really, how do I do this before Cassandra comes back and yells at me?”

            Solas smirked at that and grabbed the saddle and nodded to the blanket. “Start with this.”

            As it turns out, he did know a thing or two. And he was a good teacher, allowing me to do all of the actions while giving minimal suggestions. I figured out the names of objects on my own and only latched the wrong thing once.

            “You’re a quick learner,” the mage smiled approvingly. I shrugged and shook my head.

            “Just lucky with first-time attempts. You remember my fighting,” I took Pepper’s halter and lead her out into the road. Then I frowned a little and looked on ahead at Cassandra and Varric. They both had horses, Varric’s being a pony to better be suited for his height, but I did not see one for Solas. “What about you?” I frowned.

            “What about me?” he tilted his head and I pointed at Pepper.

            “Where’s your horse? You’re not walking are you?”

            “I always walk,” he said casually. I immediately shook my head.

            “Oh no, come on, you’ll ride with me, it’s been a while anyway, I’m sure I’ll do it wrong.” I pointed to the horse and he smiled like he thought the idea was cute.

            “Our combined weight will exhaust her faster.”

            “Then we’ll walk together after that happens,” I said simply and he looked over my face closely. I couldn’t tell if he was just holding out on his reply, or if he was really looking for something in my expression, but eventually, he nodded once.

            “All right, Herald. I will ride with you.”

            “Please,” I shook my head, “Just call me Christi.”

            “Christi,” he nodded.

            I climbed up onto Pepper’s back and Solas joined me, nimbly settling in behind me as if he was weightless. I glanced back at him and perked a brow, “Ready?”

            He rested his hands on my hips and indicated forward with his chin. “Yes, let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What was that with Solas and Cullen there? Hmm...


	5. I Take a Rest, I Push the Pause

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Solas finds out where Christi's from.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I take a rest, I push the pause   
> ~Game Over, Falling in Reverse

            Three days. Three days of walking, riding, sleeping on bedrolls, and more walking. People could travel longer than horses, despite what movies had you believe, they were better for short distances because they could outrun a man. But people could outpace horses, and pretty much every other animal out there. That’s what made us great hunters, we could track down prey until they dropped. Which meant the mounts decided how long we would travel.

            It gave me plenty of time to talk to Varric and Solas, though. We talked about them, mostly, because I was afraid to say something wrong. Solas told stories he didn’t in game, talked about things he’d seen during his dreams in the Fade, especially in the nights we spent traveling. He could point out things that were along the way.

            I dreamed of home, though, and it made me cry a little when I woke up. I hid it quickly, because I didn’t want the others asking me what was wrong, but I think Solas saw it. I was also worried he was actually in my dreams, because I did see him in them. Since the elf mage I was playing on Inquisition had started to romance Solas, she spoke with him in a dream after Haven had been attacked.

            He almost kissed her, but I had full intentions of romancing Cullen on that playthrough so I quickly friendzoned the elf and ran off to the curly haired commander. I was starting to remember why I flirted so much with the elf, though. He was witty, funny when he wanted to be, and clever.

            It made listening to him engaging and helped pass the time. I also couldn’t help but say things that were obvious flirts. The elf usually laughed them off as they should be. I flirted with all my friends as jokes, it was how I acted. Hell, I threw some flirts at Varric and he knew exactly what I was doing. But sometimes I’d slip up and say something to Solas that was a little too forward and I’d have to backtrack right out of the conversation.

            Since making a comment about having a thing for guys with scars, I’d avoided alone time with him, preferring to spend my campfire talks with Varric who bounced story ideas off of me. I enjoyed it and helped him figure out so plot twists he desperately wanted to work in to his latest work.

            Tomorrow we’d make it to the Hinterlands and get some camps built up. I sat down beside Varric who was slurping down a bowl of stew Solas had put together. Cassandra was walking the perimeter of the camp again with some of the other soldiers. I rubbed my hands together to warm them from the chilly night air. It was warmer down here than it had been up in Haven, but it was still cold.

            “Here, Dreamer,” Varric grabbed a bowl and held it over to the elf. Solas filled it with broth, getting a couple chunks of meat into it.

            “Thanks,” I said and took it with eager fingers. The spoon was oddly shaped, like the ones you’d get from Hibachi grills. The soup was good, a little bland, but they didn’t exactly have a kitchen out in the woods, so I didn’t complain. I kicked my shoes off and stuck them up closer to the fire so that they’d warm me up while I ate the soup.

            “What _is_ that?” Varric asked, gesturing to my right foot. “I’ve seen it before but I never got the chance to ask.”

            “I, too, am curious,” Solas admitted, head tilting as he looked at the tattoo.

            “It’s a xenomorph, a, uh, creature from my favorite story,” I said, trying to think of the best way to word it. “I call him Ra.” The tattoo was a detailed line drawing of the famous alien from the Alien franchise. It crawled along my foot, looking like it was reaching for my big toe. Its long tail was coiled behind it, poised to strike, and overlapped my anklebone. When I moved my toes it made it look like the alien was breathing, and reaching with its extended hand.

            “The detail is amazing, is this what they look like exactly?” Varric looked closer at it in the firelight.

            “Yeah, pretty much, the tail was made a little too big, in the original drawing it was too small, and then when the artist scaled it up it was a bit too big, but I like it well enough, I think it balances the piece,” then I leaned down and pulled the skin some to look at the mouth. “There should also be teeth, right now the mouth is empty. I was going to go back and have him fix it, but… well, I can’t do that now,” I grinned and straightened back up.

            “It looks like a predator,” Solas commented and sat down beside me with a bowl of soup.

            “Oh yeah, and they’re a _huge_ terror. The ones that look like this would be a little bigger than six feet or so. And they can stand on their back legs like people. They have a second mouth inside of this one that they jut out to break skulls and ribs, killing you. It can get through most helmets too.”

            Varric swore and shook his head. “And you _like_ them?”

            “Well, I like the stories about them, they’re my favorites. I have other favorites too, but I hadn’t decided on tattoos for them yet,” I shrugged and looked down at it. “Telling people about them always reminds me of just how scary they are. I’ve, uh, read the stories a lot and know what’s going to happen, so I don’t get scared anymore.” I pulled my foot closer and ran a finger along the ink. “They’re not real, though. Just works of fiction.”

            Solas asked some questions about the xenomorph and I told him and Varric about their life cycle, from ovimorph egg to chestburster to drone, and then about the queen. While Solas looked utterly fascinated, Varric looked like he was about to shit himself. Of course, talk of Alien led to talk of Predator, and then the crossover between them. I ended up telling them detailed run-throughs of each of the movies in order and which were my favorites. Varric left to go to sleep after AVP, leaving Solas and I talking over full bellies and empty bowls about the pluses and minuses to either alien.

            “I would very much like to read these stories, they are nothing like I have heard before,” he said with a grin that could melt my heart if I wasn’t so tired.

            The sun was no doubt an hour or so from rising and I was still awake after traveling all day. “Maybe sometime I’ll find a way to share it with you,” I said and then stretched. “I really need to sleep.”

            “Of course, I should not have kept you,” Solas stood and offered me a hand. I made it a point to give him as much help in getting me up as I could. My weight had to be at least double his and I didn’t think I could handle the embarrassment of pulling him down instead of him getting me up. He didn’t say anything, or even grunt as I got to my feet and I noted our hands were held together a second longer than necessary. I let go, worried I was the one weirdly extending the contact.

            “You travel the Fade, the dream realm, does that mean you can see other people’s dreams?” I asked suddenly, a thought occurring to me.

            “Sometimes, it’s difficult to reach someone specific, the Fade is a tricky place but, if they let me in, it’s easier,” he said with a casual roll of the shoulders.

            “Maybe I can dream about the stories and you can see what I mean,” I offered. A yawn tore my jaw wide and I fought it shut best I could. Solas chuckled at my attempt and waved for me to lead the way to our respected bedrolls. Varric was snoring away on his back with his hands on his stomach.

            “I’ll sleep beside him,” Solas waved for me to take his roll instead. “He won’t bother me.”

            “Thanks,” I smiled gratefully and then dropped down into the bed with very little grace. “Ninight, Solas,” I huffed as I tucked my arm under my head to use as a pillow.

            “Good night, Christi.”

 

 

            _I stood outside an old-fashioned movie theater, the kind that had one ticket box facing the sidewalk and had the large white display above the entrance with the names of the showing movies. The man in the ticket booth was faceless, a dark outline of a human. I asked for two tickets and was given the slips of paper._

_“This is…”_

_I spun around to find Solas looking very out of place on the city sidewalk. It was raining lightly, the kind of drizzle that’s visually nice but annoying to walk through. Cars of all sorts, past and present were parked along the street or passed by slowly. The buildings around us were tall and lacked all defining traits. The only thing that stood out was the bright light of the movie theater, red and white, flashing and welcoming. Warm in the brisk night air._

_“Welcome to my world,” I grinned._

_“I thought you were from Thedas?” he came forward. As he strode closer, the robes he wore faded into a black tailored suit, old-fashioned and slick. Solas stopped and looked himself over, holding his arms out to observe the clothing’s movement. “This is interesting.”_

_“It’s for dressing up and going to fancy places,” I said and then shifted where I stood to look down at myself. I was in a dress. My figure had scaled down, I’d lost a lot of weight while in Thedas. It was nice to be home, though. “Come on, the movie is starting.”_

_“Movie?” Solas tilted his head and I led him inside._

_“We have to get popcorn,” I looped my arm through his and pulled him over to the concessions where faceless men and women paced around, busy with cleaning and cooking. The smell of movie theater popcorn wafted into our faces and I beamed at the shocked expression on the elf’s face._

_“What is…?” he looked up at the menu and saw the endless pictures of my favorite movie theater snacks. “What is that twisted one? It looks like bread?”_

_“It’s a pretzel, you eat them with cheese dip.” My mouth watered and I ordered one of everything. The staff brought us a weightless platter and I grabbed it. “Come on, we’re in Theater One,” I said and snagged Solas with my free hand._

_Fingers locked together, we went over to the person who checks your ticket to make sure you’re going in the right movie, and then we went up to the only showroom in the building. The seating and screen were larger than IMAX with the new leather reclining seats. There were ads starting for movies I’d seen and ones I hadn’t yet. Solas froze in the doorway, staring up at the screen as I charged up the steps and found the perfect seat in the empty theater._

_“Solas!” I called and waved for him. He tore his eyes from the screen and came up the steps to sit beside me._

_“What is this magic?”_

_“Not magic, silly, just technology,” I said with a shrug and balanced the platter on the row of seats in front of us._

_“I do not understand,” he twisted in his seat to look up at the projector box and then at the seat he was in._

_I pressed the button on my chair to start reclining it and grinned at the awe on his face. “Don’t try to understand it, I’ll explain another time, just watch the movies,” I nodded toward the screen as Deadpool 2’s trailer faded and the beginning of Alien started. “By the way, this is rated R.”_

_“I do not know what that means.”_

_“Means it’s for grown-ups. Swearing, blood, death, violence, that kind of thing. This movie gave people heart attacks when it first came to theaters. People_ died _just watching it,” I said and Solas’ eyes widened more. Slowly, he turned to face the screen._

_I grabbed the popcorn off the platter and sat it in his lap._

_“You’ll need that.”_

_“Why?”_

_“When shit gets real, you’ll want to eat,” I nodded to it and grabbed the pretzel. “Stress eating.”_

_Solas gulped and picked up a piece of popcorn, putting it in his mouth slowly. His eyes widened at the taste and then he looked at me. “This is–”_

_“Shh, watch,” I said and pointed at the letters on the screen finally made the title floating through space._

_Solas didn’t speak for the whole movie after that. But he jumped out of his seat and threw the popcorn, and screamed once._

_By the time it was over, though, he was hooked._

_“Another,” he said_

_Aliens was next up but the theater shook and faded away. I looked at Solas, confused, but he was gone._

            I jerked awake and rubbed my eyes. A person was in front of me, blurred from closeness and sleep in my eyes.

            “Wake up, you have overslept,” Cassandra growled and tossed something at me, covering my head.

            I pulled it off my head and rubbed my eyes again. It was a thick wrap of some sort, it looked waterproof. “Oh man, is it going to rain?” I frowned and sniffed the air.

            Solas was sitting on the bedroll beside me staring at me. I smiled a little and then tried to bite it away.

            “I had a pretty cool dream last night, you were in it,” I said and then stiffened some as I realized that he might have _actually_ have been in it.

            “Yes, I was,” he said, his blue-grey eyes wide. “It was…”

            “Oh my God, you were there,” I whispered and leaned closer. “You… saw it all? I didn’t just imagine you there?”

            “I was there,” he nodded. “I thought you were from Thedas, what was that place?”

            I gulped and looked around. Cassandra and the others were packing up the camp. They were almost done it looked like. “Well, now you know,” I said and sighed. “I’m not exactly from around here.”

            “What was that place?”

            “Earth, sort of, it was just… me imagining it, but it was a movie theater, an old one, they don’t all look like that, and that one was really big, but–”

            “That is what your world looks like?”

            “Yeah, a bit,” I shrugged.

            “It’s… amazing,” he breathed and stood up, running a hand over his head, through the stubble growing there. It was a little lighter than his brows, but still obviously orange. I knew he’d shave it clean soon. “You were not aware you were dreaming during the events?”

            “Not at all,” I shook my head. “I thought I’d gotten back home.”

            “You were able to transfer information to me, the taste and smell of the food. It must be strong within your memories,” he said as we rolled up our mats.

            “Oh yeah, my family and I would go all the time.”

            “I would very much like to do that again,” he said, a smile on his lips. “The movie was… that’s what it’s called? A movie?”

            “Yeah, like a book has titles, a movie does as well. That one was Alien. The next one is Aliens, and then Alien 3 and then Alien Resurrection.” I grinned. “And then there are the prequels, which come before them.”

            “And the ones about the Predators,” he added, looking like a fanboy already.

            “Oh yes, and the crossovers, and that’s just one fandom, well, two, but yeah,” I smirked and the elf shook his head.

            “Amazing.”

            “What’re you two talking about?” Varric stopped in front of us and Solas schooled his expression.

            “The xenomorph stories.”

            The dwarf shuddered and shook his head. “No thank you, count me out.”

            “It’s okay, we can talk about other stories, or even something you guys are more familiar with than me,” I said and gestured to the trees around us. “Like is it going to rain, is that what this is for?”

            “Oh yes,” Varric nodded and pulled out his own raincoat. “This part of Ferelden is famous for its downpours, Dreamer. You’re going to enjoy yourself.”

            “Fuuuu–” I breathed and looked over at Solas who smiled and finished packing our things. It was going to be a long day already.


	6. Trying Hard to Beat the Stage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassandra and Christi have a heart to heart... sort of?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trying Hard to Beat the Stage  
> ~Game over, Falling in Reverse

            Lead Scout Harding was the nicest woman she could possibly be in her position. She greeted me with a smile as our tired band approached the camp.

            “The Herald of Andraste,” she came forward, hands behind her back. She looked up at me with a bit of admiration. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Your Worship.”

            “Oh God, please don’t call me that,” I breathed and felt a blush coming on.

            “You _are_ the Herald, right?” the dwarf woman raised an eyebrow.

            “She is,” Cassandra appeared at my side, saddlebags in hand from her horse. “But she is to be treated with suspicion,” the Seeker added. Her brown eyes flicked to me and narrowed.

            Before I could say anything, Harding spoke up, “Why is that, Seeker?”

            “She came from the Fade, indeed, but there is more to her we have yet to figure out,” she started to walk away but another voice cutting in stopped her.

            “How unnecessary, not to mention unprofessional, Seeker.”

            We three turned to Solas as he approached, Dr Pepper’s reins in hand. “Excuse me?” Cassandra tilted her head at him. “You know as much as I, Solas–”

            “I’m afraid I don’t,” he said, making it sound like she knew more rather than the other way around. “But we both know this woman is no threat. She has done nothing against us or, despite what you want to believe, given us reason to believe she will.”

            Cassandra stood a little straighter so she didn’t have to look up at him so much. He was probably just at six foot, tall for an elf, I assumed seeing they were normally smaller than humans in the game. The Seeker was two or so inches shorter, but she was bigger than him, built like the warrior she was.

            “This is not the time, nor place, Solas.”

            “Indeed, Seeker,” the elf’s pale brows drew together and he met her stare evenly. I couldn’t see his face as clearly as I could hers, but something about it must have worked because Cassandra took a step back and turned to Harding.

            “We rest for the night and head out in the morning. We must speak with Master Dennet if we are going to get horses for the Inquisition.” She looked to me then. “Is there something you’d like to share with us about it?”

            I frowned and folded my arms, “He’ll want something in return, obviously, he’s not just going to donate his best horses to an infant organization that pissed off the Chantry.”

            Solas smirked but Cassandra narrowed her eyes. “Such as?”

            “Protection?  _I_ can hear the fighting going on down there, I don’t need Harding’s report to tell you things are bad,” I gestured to the fires in the distance, bright in the dying light. “Even if he did just give them to us, how do we protect a line of horses marching up to Haven? We don’t have the people for that.”

            Solas turned his eyes over to Cassandra. “She has a point, Seeker, it’s common sense,” he added as if to point out you didn’t need to see the future to know I was right.

            “We will see about putting up watchtowers,” she said and then narrowed her eyes at me. We looked each other in the eye, but I knew she could easily take me. I wasn’t a fighter. “Anything else?”

            I shook my head, not feeling like spilling about the cursed wolves, or the many side missions that could be completed while we were here. And then a thought occurred to me. Blackwall wasn’t far from here. He didn’t spawn until Leliana gave the quest, after we got horses for the Inquisition, if memory serves. Or was he after Val Royeaux? Ah shit, I knew that was going to happen eventually.

            I frowned to myself and bit my lip, trying to remember just when Blackwall came into the picture when a hand touched my shoulder. I looked up and Solas tilted his head, “You look troubled.”

            “Just, trying to remember how everything went,” I said, hoping he understood what I meant. He nodded once and waved for me to follow him to where we would set up our tents.

            “Okay, Dream, what other tattoos do you have?” Varric asked as he flattened out his bedroll. I smiled a little and gestured to the armor I was wearing.

            “You can’t see them?” The dwarf raised an eyebrow with a smile and I started to work off the plate covering the chain. “I have a scorpion on my shoulder, my mom and I got matching ones together. And then I have the stars and xenomorph you’ve seen. And I have a veteran tribute to my parents on my calf,” I said gesturing to the points vaguely.

            “Scorpion? Like, the spider’s with big claws and tails?” Varric wrinkled his nose at the mental image.

            I smiled, “Yeah, they’re my favorite bug. I’ve always thought they were cool.”

            “You have a very interesting taste in _favorites_ ,” the dwarf said. Solas chuckled.

            I shrugged, trying to grab one of the straps that should release me from the shoulder plates. “I like things that are dangerous, they have their own kind of beauty.”

            The elf noticed my struggle and helped me get out of the layers of armor I’d been stuck in since leaving Haven. It was stiff and decided I didn’t want to get back in it. Dressed in only the thin under clothes meant to keep armor from chafing, I took the opportunity to show the dwarf and elf my tattoos, though the one on my shoulder was difficult for me to expose and required Solas moving my shirt.

            We spent some time going over the designs of the tattoos, why the scorpion looked so feminine whole the xenomorph and the eagle on my calf looked more realistic. It was a nice conversation that then drifted into elven traditions of facial tattoos. Solas didn’t have any, but he knew all about them. I mentioned where I came from most facial tattoos resulted in unemployment. But tattoos, where I came from, were almost always more than decorative lines with historical meaning.

            Varric turned in before Solas and I did again, and the moment he was out Solas turned to me and said, “What will we watch tonight?”

            I tried not to laugh, so it came out like a snort. “I’m sorry, Solas, I can’t control my dreams, they always just… do their own thing. I can’t promise that I won’t dream about my childhood home being attacked by dinosaurs,” I said honestly.

            “What is a dinosaur?”

            “Oh,” I touched my forehead with my palm and shook my head. “I guess anything I dream would entertain you then.”

            “I wish to learn about this place you’re from, Earth you said?”

            “Yes, it’s a lot like Thedas, but, well,” I frowned. “But different.”

            “Obviously,” he stated, not sarcastically.

            “Okay, well, I’ll try to think up the theater again and we’ll watch Aliens, it’s the second movie.” I turned to my bedroll and tried to adjust my pack for a pillow.

            “How, do the pictures move?”

            “Oh, that’s actually kind of easy to explain,” I said and turned back to him. “It’s actually just a bunch of pictures back to back to back and your brain thinks they’re moving. Here, I can show you with some paper and something to draw with.”

            Sleep all but forgotten, we ended up back by the fire and I used a piece of paper torn up into a stack of sheets about the same size. Then I drew a circle, gradually moving the circle down on the pages until it hit the ‘bottom’ and flattened, then drew it bouncing up. Then I used my thumb to play it for him.

            Solas was astonished. “That is amazing,” he shook his head and I handed him the flipbook so that he could do it himself. “And this is what they did with the movies?”

            “Yeah, it’s a bit more complicated because they use a camera that takes a picture of what’s in front of it,” I started explaining to the best of my knowledge. It helped as much as it hurt that I only knew the basics of this kind of thing. I was able to use terms he understood, but I couldn’t answer all his questions. Then I described how in only my lifetime we’d gone from VHS tapes to Blue-Ray and digital downloads.

            The internet was a whole new concept that was too large to get into this late.

            A couple times the person on watch tried to join our conversation, but eventually, we made it back to our bedrolls and we were left alone.

            I fell asleep talking about my laptop, how I could play music and write at the same time as message multiple people instantly, and have it announce the time to me regularly. I didn’t get into all the other things it could do.

            But I dreamed of the movie theater again, and Solas and I enjoyed the rest of the Alien series before a grumpy Cassandra woke me up.

 

 

            Horse Master Dennet looked over Dr Pepper with a keen eye and nodded. “She looks good, I shouldn’t be surprised the Herald of Andraste has a decent horse. There are better, but she’ll serve you well,” he turned back to us and I grinned.

            “Thank you.”

            “As for helping you? I can’t just go sending all my best horses up the road. Bandits and thieves would be on them faster than flies on crap.”

            I glanced sideways at Cassandra, noting the strain in her jaw. “I understand,” I said with a smile. “We’ve already thought of that. We have scouts putting up watchtowers all along the roads between here and Haven to make sure no one gets the drop on us.”

            “It’s a start,” he said and crossed his arms. “My wife complained of wolves attacking our farm hands. We can’t go losing good workers like that.”

            “We’ll personally take care of the wolves,” Cassandra promised.

            Dennet seemed to be pleased by this and nodded, excusing himself. We were left alone then and Cassandra turned to me.

            “Did you know about the wolves?”

            I opened my mouth, but Solas cut in, “Seeker, don’t embarrass yourself.”

            She spun on him then, her eyes narrowed. “What do you know of this, Solas? You held no allegiance to her, but now you jump to her aid whenever I speak to her.”

            “Only when you accuse her based on your own paranoia,” the mage said coolly.

            That made her mad. Cassandra growled, made a disgusted noise, and went to her horse, not sparing me another glance. Varric frowned, looking rather conflicted. I knew he was close to the Seeker, more than either wanted to admit, but I also knew this wasn’t the same Cassandra from the game. She had been given new information at the start and that meant her response to everything was different.

            The dwarf went to his pony and I sighed, my shoulders sinking as I went to Pepper and rifled through my saddlebag to find the map that Harding gave me.

            Solas slid into my peripheral and tilted his head, “You know where the wolves are?”

            “Yeah,” I sighed softly. “Just off this waterfall here, it’s not far. There’s a demon acting as alpha, making them… fiercer. They won’t run off like normal wolves.”

            “Interesting,” he touched his chin in thought.

            “You’re actually the one who deduced it,” I added and he blinked at me.

            “In the future you saw?”

            “Yeah, we fought them and you,” I waved to imply I was I said before. He nodded.

            “I still do not understand how you can know our future. You haven’t shown any sign of magic beyond it, and the world you come from does not seem to lend itself to premonitions.”

            “Yeah, well,” I shrugged, not sure if I wanted to break the news to him just yet. “Shit happens, as we say in my world. We can’t explain everything, and everything doesn’t need explaining.”

            The elf was about to reply when Cassandra rode up beside us, a frown heavy on her lips. “Are you coming?”

            “Yes,” I put the map back into the saddlebags. I knew the layout of the Hinterlands well enough when I remembered the scale from the game was only a fraction.

            “We’ll try to the south, and work from there.” The Seeker trotted off.

            “Good start,” I said and climbed onto Pepper. Solas followed, settling in behind me. I tried to ignore the growing feelings I had for him. It was easy enough in the game, the third person POV and lack of continuous conversation lent the friendships and romances rather story like, but this was more. It was a lot of real conversations that were never remotely touched on in the game, along with the actual proximity and physical touch.

            Solas’ hands rested on my hips to keep him in place. I was given some leather Inquisition soldier armor that was lighter than what had been made for me. I liked it better already, but it meant I could feel the pressure from the elf’s grip better. He didn’t cling to me, but if Pepper took a weird step, or moved suddenly, his touch tightened.

            I pushed the thoughts away and focused on the quest ahead of us. The wolves. Those weren’t going to be all that hard, they’re just wolves, normal animals. The demon would be the hard one. I still had the sword I picked up at the start of all this, and I’d done some work with it so I actually contributed to the fight. Now we would see if I could actually help.

            When we reached the river we found some wolves. They attacked right away, but Solas cast a barrier over the horses and their riders to keep them safe. He leaped off and started casting spells as Cassandra drew her sword and charged her horse into the fray. Varric dismounted to start firing. I hung back, afraid to get in the way.

            The three wolves weren’t much of a fight for the team. Cassandra knelt beside one and looked at its eyes. Solas stood nearby, holding his staff in both hands as he leaned onto it, observing over the Seeker’s shoulder. “It appears a demon has taken control of the pack. If we dispatch it, then the wolves should resume hunting in the woods instead of the farms.”

            I grinned a little and trotted Dr Pepper over to him. Cassandra stood up and nodded. “Their tracks come from this direction, the rest of the pack should be that way.”

            It was nice not having to be the leader, like in the game. It no doubt put Cassandra at ease as well, the fewer questions I had answers to, the better. “Sounds like a plan, how do you want to approach this?”

            “You’ll stay with the horses,” she said. It was like a punch to the gut.

            “I,” the word came out alone, with nothing backing it.

            “Someone has to keep them from running off,” she said and then made a point to look at Solas and the Varric. I was the weakest link. “If there is a Rift, we will come for you.”

            Solas didn’t object, and that almost hurt worse. I looked over at him and he avoided my gaze. My mouth hung open and I tried to think of an argument that would get me to come along. ‘To get experience’ was the only thing I could come up with. It wasn’t a strong argument, but it was my only one. “How will I learn if I don’t come with?”

            “You don’t learn by getting killed,” Cassandra said. I wanted to argue that with game-logic, but I bit my tongue and set my jaw.

            When Cassandra started off down the river, the rest of us followed and I tried not to let my emotions get the better of me. I ended up just standing outside the cave like we discussed, hold the horses, and wait for them to handle the demon and wolf pack. Christiane von Faelenberg, the Herald of Andraste, Holder of Horses, Benchwarmer of Battles, and Dodger of Dangers.

            I sighed pathetically while I stood with the mounts and felt the itch to check my pocket, not for the first time, for my phone. I quelled it before actually reaching, but I still felt the pang of sadness. It was nicer to pass time with something like reading or watching a video, but now I just had the beautiful countryside of Ferelden to sate my boredom.

            I could hear the sound of fighting inside the cave, but it didn’t seem they were struggling. The howls of pain far outweighed the cries of surprise. I tried to enjoy the wind blowing the trees, and the cool, sunny day, but I kept itching to go in the cave, at least to _watch_ what happened.

            Dr Pepper raised her head, jerking my grip on her reins. I looked up to where she turned her attention to and noticed several templars coming my way. They’d noticed me –hard not to when I had three horses that very much drew attention– but they weren’t rushing forward in attack stance like I expected. In the game, they were hostile immediately, just like the mages.

            Which meant this couldn’t be good.

            “What’s this?” the one in front said, his voice thick with the Ferelden accent. “A mage with stolen horses, perhaps?”

            “I have to be a mage?” I asked and frowned at him. “And they have to be stolen?”

            “They look like good horses, better than you could afford,” he came up to me, flanked by two men, one of them an archer. “Based on your armor.”

            “They were gifts,” I said and moved to stand more in front of Dr Pepper. I liked templars, I like mages, too. I liked the Chantry, and Ferelden, and pretty much everything in Thedas. The thing about Bioware’s games, were that they were realistic. Which meant good organizations had bad people in them. And bad organizations had good people in them. Mass Effect and Dragon Age were great at displaying this. These were bad guys from a good organization, lost in a war they weren’t trained for, taking advantage of people to didn’t deserve it.

            “A thief’s words,” he was shorter than me, so he straightened up to look bigger. I knew he would win the fight. He had superior training and two men, but I wasn’t going to let him off easy.

            This was going to go one way, and I had one chance to get in a surprise attack.

            I grabbed my sword and in as fluid a motion as my untrained arm could manage, drawing it out to strike the Templar in the throat. It was the only exposed part of him I could see, and because he was looking up at me just enough, it would allow me to access the soft flesh there.

            Unfortunately, he was far better trained and had his sword drawn before mine reached his neck. He used his blade to push mine away and came forward a step, crowding me.

            His free hand grabbed my throat and I lashed out with my foot, getting him in the knee. But it was armored, so he barely grunted.

            The other templars behind him came around, one with a bow pointed an arrow at me and the other came around more relaxed and took the horse reins from my other hand. I felt my heart drop as he squeezed my wrist tightly until I released the leather.

            I wished I had the mark’s ability, but I wouldn’t get that for some time, and I had no idea how to activate it beforehand. I wished I knew magic. I wished I was a better fighter.

            Tears stung my eyes and I realized that the templar was squeezing my throat tighter. The sides, the kind that didn’t hurt as bad, but kept breathability low. I sucked in a breath and tried to swing my sword again, but he twisted his and I lost my grip.

            “You should have just let us take the horses,” he said, leaning in so that I could smell the tang of his helmet. “We might have let you go.”

            I sucked in a breath and grabbed his wrist, then his fingers, trying to pry them off of my neck. “You’re not very smart,” I grunted out.

            He blinked, dark eyes narrow. “Excuse me?”

            “Aren’t you curious why,” I started to say and sucked in another breath. His curiosity got the better of him and he relented just enough to allow me to breathe. “Why I have three horses?”

            He blinked and I grabbed his helmet, jerking it down and then back so that it shifted his line of sight. His fingers tightened back around my neck but I got a hand up under his faceguard.

            The archer loosed the arrow but I barely managed to miss it. It tore a hole in my leather armor’s shoulder, but I didn’t think too hard about it. As he drew another arrow I got my fingers up into the eye of the templar. He jerked me around, knowing what I was trying to do, but he had a better grip, and a sword.

            He ran that blade right up into me, just like that demon did with its claws. There was just one problem. My skin prickled green and I didn’t feel a thing.

            I looked down and saw the sword withdraw without a drop of blood. My armor wasn’t even fractured. I remembered the fireball punching me in the chest, but otherwise leaving me untouched and realized that the barrier worked in more interesting ways than simply shielding.

            The templar jerked away from me and looked up.

            The archer was firing arrows behind me, and the third was running off with the horses.

            I didn’t have to look back to know Solas and them were coming down from the mouth of the cave. I ducked down, relishing my release from the templar, and grabbed my sword. He kicked me, right in the face with his booted foot. The whiplash hurt, but I didn’t actually feel his strike. I fell down and grunted, touching my neck.

            He threw another kick into my side as the archer loosed arrow after arrow. I knew what the templar was doing, working down the barrier strength so he could kill me. But he didn’t have enough time. A bolt from a crossbow found his shoulder and he flinched back.

            I threw myself onto my feet and started running after the horses.

            The templar grabbed me by my braided hair and jerked me back. I yelped, feeling the straight on my roots. I hit the ground and threw my legs out, kicking him as hard as I could while I still couldn’t feel it. My leather shoes wouldn’t protect me against kicking steel.

            The archer went down, Cassandra’s sword wedged up under his plate, but the templar above me was untouched. I realized when he moved over me it was because he also had a barrier on him. His proximity to me must have worked to his benefit. The bolt in his shoulder wasn’t bleeding, just resting there, slowly pushing out as his body rejected it.

            Cassandra ran after the horses, and I felt a wave of defeat wash over me. I felt sick for more reasons than being kicked by a templar. I’d failed. I had one job. And I couldn’t even do that right.

            I went limp there in the grass and the templar reached down, grabbing my throat again. He lifted me up into a sitting position and then put his sword to my neck. I looked in the direction he was speaking and realized Solas was standing there, his staff pointed at us, but he wasn’t willing to risk me getting hurt. Varric held Bianca ready but didn’t fire.

            “Put the staff down, apostate,” he growled, “Or she’s going to find it very hard to breathe here in a moment.”

            “You harm her and you will regret it, not to mention you will no longer have a bargaining tool,” Solas sneered, his expression filled with more hate than I’d ever seen.

            The templar seemed to consider this and pulled me up so we stood together. He held my hair and used it to pull my head backward, exposing my throat.

            Jesus, this was a cliché scene. I couldn’t believe I’d ended up in this position.

            Then I realized something. He’s not holding a gun. And I wasn’t tied up.

            I almost rolled my eyes.

            I threw my arms up and knocked the sword away. It wasn’t a bright idea, but a hand at his wrist and at the blade got it to back off. Then I dove forward, under it when he tried to swing up to get me in the throat. His grip on my hair was tight, but the force of my weight rushing forward ripped it out of his gloved grasp. And the moment I was down, Varric shot and Solas threw a static charge.

            The templar started forward, but Solas spun his staff and a lightning strike came down from the sky, striking the templar right in the head.

            Electricity ran down his body, into the earth as thunder clapped. I could feel the charge running through the ground. It jarred me, causing my body to stiffen and jerk in a short spasm. Then the man dropped in a dead heap and I was safe.

            Solas reached me first and pulled something out of his satchel. I knew it was a health potion before he uncorked it.

            “I’m fine,” I said and started to sit up. My whole body was tingling. It felt like I’d just been, well, shocked. I was only used to that feeling on my fingertips when I touched doors after walking on the carpet in the winter. It was strange to feel it all over. It left me feeling rigid and a bit tired. “I’ll be fine,” I said and tried to smile.

            Solas didn’t look convinced and put a hand behind my head and held the potion in front of me, “Just drink this.”

            I sighed and took it from him so I could at least avoid _some_ embarrassment. Varric was standing beside me, worry plain on his face. “What’d you say to piss them off so bad?”

            “They accused me of being a mage with stolen horses, and I… wasn’t? So, honestly, there was nothing I could have done,” I said, looking up as Cassandra returned. She had blood spatter across her uniform, but I didn’t linger on it, instead, I watched her expression.

            “You should have given them the horses.”

            “What?” I nearly jumped to my feet.

            “Better that you live,” she said bitterly, glaring down at me. “They are horses, we can get more. We cannot get another Herald.”

            Frustration ran through me. I knew she was going to be mad, but I thought it was going to be because I couldn’t defend the horses. “So you wouldn’t have been mad at me for just giving them up?” I asked for clarification. “Because, from where I’m sitting, it seems like nothing I do will get rid of your attitude.” The words were out before I could stop them.

            Cassandra opened her mouth, but I stopped her with a waving hand and stood up, with some help from Solas.

            “I’m sick of it. I’ve been here ten days and I can’t catch a break. I’m sorry I’m not used to doing this kind of thing, but I am trying, Cassandra. I’m trying to help, I’m doing my best. I wasn’t lying when I told you I would do whatever I could to fix this.” I was crying. It burned my eyes and blurred my vision, but I pushed through it because if I stopped to notice them I would start sobbing and then I’d lose all my steam. “I can’t fight if I don’t learn, and I can’t know what to do in every situation. You told me to watch the horses, giving them off to bullies isn’t watching them. I can’t just sit by and let things happen. I did that before and I can’t anymore,” I was letting out too much and needed to stop, but I couldn’t, it flowed out of me. “I miss my home, but I’m here, and I’m here to stay for an undetermined length of time. So until the Fade takes me, you’re stuck with me, for better or worse. I’m the fucking Herald of Andraste, and that’s going to be important. I did _not_ ask for this, but this was the hand we were dealt, and now you have to get off your high horse and understand that rash judgment doesn’t always work. You don’t have all the information. Neither do I, despite everything,” I waved my arms in a vague gesture. “We’re going to have to figure this out together, and we can do that if you can’t trust me just a little. Enough to help me learn. Enough not to question and second guess _everything_ I do.”

            My breathing came in rapid pants as I finished up the monologue and I wiped at the tear trails down my cheeks. I was happy she didn’t seem bothered by them. Ignoring them was best for both of us.

            The Seeker nodded and put her sword back in its scabbard. “Okay.”

            “Okay?” I breathed, eyebrows drawing together.

            “Okay, I will try to trust you more,” she said carefully. “I was wrong to accuse you of destroying the Temple, and because of your knowledge, I have seen you as a threat instead of an ally. I apologize.”

            “Thank you,” I said, feeling a little lighter.

            She glanced at Solas and then Varric. “We should return to the farm before night keeps us from returning to camp.”

            “Can I look in the cave?” I said suddenly. I’d gotten the sudden itch to check to see if the loot from the game was the same. “It’ll only take a few moments, Solas can come with me,” I said and looked at the elf who nodded.

            Cassandra sighed and nodded once. “You have ten minutes and then we’re leaving, and I will drag you back.”

            “Thank you,” I grinned and followed the elf up into the cave, feeling a little more apart of the group now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was getting sick of Cassandra being the bad guy, but I just couldn't force her into a 180 without an explanation. It worked out because /I/ would have lost my shit on her by this point, so of course, Christi had to. Maybe now she'll be more like the game Cassandra.


	7. Looking for a Better Way to Play it!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time to have that talk with Mother Giselle. And Solas gets to see more dreams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Looking for a better way to play it!  
> ~Game Over, Falling in Reverse

            Horse Master Dennet was pleased to hear we’d handled the wolves as well as placed markers for future watchtowers. He promised the horses when the towers were done. Cassandra said we would have to go back to Haven and coordinate with Josephine, Leliana, and Cullen to get them built, I already knew this, the three of them had their own ways of doing things, and because of the game, I knew the basics of how to pick who.

            But we sent a raven to tell them of the plan so they could get some ideas together while we made more progress in the Hinterlands. Harding reported some locations we could find Fade Rifts, templars in mass numbers, and a group of mages that were causing trouble for the locals. Mother Giselle, the original reason for coming this way, wasn’t able to talk yet. She was up to her knees in the starved and dying. She wouldn’t be able to talk until something was done about the refugees coming to her camp.

            This was different from the game, but I understood. Cassandra seemed a little irritated, but I could have been reading her body language wrong. She seemed to be irritated a lot.

            We –Solas, Cassandra, Varric, and I– went out to clean up the mage and templar camps. It wasn’t that hard since I knew the relative locations and sort of guided the way using the map and made up directions from Harding. Cassandra didn’t question it, Solas knew better, but Varric gave me a funny look.

            I was starting to get the feeling he was catching on.

            He would cut in while Solas and I spoke casually of my dreams, and asked about keywords that he didn’t understand. It was hard to lie to him, and I decided I’d have to tell him the truth soon. I didn’t want it impacting our friendship.

            “Christi,” Solas grabbed my shoulder and pulled me down beside him. We were ducked behind a bush. Cassandra and Varric were out of sight, but I assumed they’d also taken cover.

            Solas peaked around the bush and narrowed his silvery blue eyes. “The mages have taken a cave. They’ve left trespassers frozen out front,” his nose wrinkled in disgust and he turned back to me. “Is this from your vision?”

            “Uh, yeah, I remember part of it,” I said and tried to think of what was useful. “I can’t tell you how many there were, but maybe half a dozen in the vision? Sometimes that needs doubled for what really happens though,” I added and remembered how there were more wolves and _far_ more demons from the Fade Rifts. The latest one we’d taken care of was the one right next to Dennet’s farm, and though it’d been easier, we still struggled with the mass overflow of demons. The wraiths were basically one–hit–kills, but one–hit–kills could overwhelm.

            “That’s more than we had before,” he said, tone grateful. Then he grabbed his staff from over his shoulder.

            “There’s at least one who is… quite proficient at spell casting,” I added, remembering the boss of the room. “He likes fire, if memory serves.”

            “Thank you,” Solas smiled, his eyes brightening some. I returned the grin and took my sword from its scabbard. I didn’t imagine I would use it much, but it was good to be prepared.

            The elf struck first, coming out from behind the bushes, hesitating long enough to confirm the mages were hostile –they reached for their staffs and began casting. Our mage was faster.

            Cassandra appeared out of the side, coming to cleave a mage’s casting arm off with her sword. I shuttered at the sight, but I’d gotten rather use to the gore as of late. If you could work past the smell it wasn’t much different from a graphic video game.

            Okay, that was a lie. It was pretty fucked up.

            I was okay with killing characters in video games, especially ones that weren’t named. But I was also the player who got attached to even side characters. I wrote fanfictions about them. I made up characters and put them into the different universes. I wrote this kind of stuff.

            I was able to keep from letting the killing get to me in the moment, though. I could probably attribute it to having military parents that had several deployments under their belts and didn’t exactly shelter me from the violence of the world.

            I hadn’t taken the life of a persona yet, only demons, but I knew the time would come. It seemed this would be it, but Varric’s aim was better than my agility. I ended up swinging at air over dropping mages. I didn’t go right for them, of course, I worked around them going for those distracted by Cassandra and Solas.

            The noise of the fighting alerted those inside to what was going on, resulting in more mages coming out. Solas had been prepared though, laying down runes that exploded when someone stepped in them. He had quite the number of spells in his inventory. The runes only stopped a couple, though. His lightning added another, and Cassandra dispatched the last.

            Varric came up to my side and I gave him a smile. He gestured to the body and said, “Don’t grow up too fast, kid.”

            My smile faded and I nodded once, understanding what he meant without needing an explanation. “Thanks,” I said and he nodded.

            We went on into the cave next. There was one man left, he had his back to the entrance, but he wasn’t just sitting idly by. Solas and I noticed the runes in the ground first. I called out as he threw a spell to activate the one in front of Cassandra, knowing she wouldn’t be able to stop her progression forward in time to avoid stepping on it.

            The explosion threw her back, stumbling her, but she seemed otherwise unharmed. Then the mage turned to us.

            Varric shot him, back to back with Bianca. The man’s skin pricked green and the bolts fell off of him a few seconds after hitting him.

            Cassandra charged forward, more careful to avoid the runes, and Solas summoned a lightning strike to get the man’s barrier down.

            I hung back, looking around for some way to help. I couldn’t help from back here. I couldn’t run up like Cassandra, my armor was too light and my sword fighting was less than desirable. I didn’t have a bow or the skill to use one if I did, to fight from back here, like Varric. Nor did I have magic I could throw like Solas.

            I was utterly useless.

            The mage threw a spell in front of him that shoved him back several feet, leaving his trail charred and aflame, daring Cassandra to rush after him right into the fire. Solas put an end to that. Ice encircled the other mage, and crawled out from him to put out the flames. Cassandra didn’t waste the chance and jumped over the remaining heat to crash her shield into the frozen pillar.

            The mage shattered into a million ice shards.

            It was over far quicker than the game had you believe. Of course, in the game some don’t die from the shattering. I didn’t think too hard about the bits lying around, and instead went to the supplies piled up along one of the walls.

            “It looks like they’ve been stealing from the villagers,” I commented, picking up a doll from one of the boxes. It was filled with items that looked like they’d just been picked from a house without a care for what it was.

            “Many homes were abandoned or the families driven out,” Cassandra nodded and tipped a box’s lid to see inside. “It would be good to tell our scouts about this location so they can get this back to the people it belonged to.”

            I nodded my agreement and we went through to find any other supplies that may go unmissed that we needed. I was more curious about the wall of the cave that in-game was a door, opened when the astrariums in the area were activated. Of course, it didn’t have a realistic value, and the wall was just that. The gems that marked the space weren’t there, and had I not played the game I wouldn’t have found anything interesting about this particular wall.

            I hid my interest well enough that not even Solas noticed my hesitation at the wall. It only took me a moment to confirm there was nothing there. I didn’t want to deal with the astrariums if I didn’t have to. They were fun little mini-game that could get really frustrating really fast, and I didn’t think I wanted to know how they would be different in a ‘real life’ simulation of the game.

            Once the cave was cleared out, we went on to find the templar camp. That was a bit more difficult, just because of the sheer amount of people we had to deal with. I took the chance to pick up a bow and quiver of arrows off a templar archer. I had used a bow twice in my life, and both times it’d been a compound bow in my parent’s backyard, shooting at targets that were not only stationary, but less than ten yards away.

            Templars running around and at me were not easy to hit, not to mention aiming for _other_ than their thick plate armor. Most of the arrows I got bounced right off of them, and the others missed entirely. Honestly, I was just happy to hit them at all. The arrows were usually enough to distract the templar long enough for one of my companions to kill them.

            And I didn’t hit an ally once.

            That made me the proudest. Mostly, I avoided aiming for templars close to my friends, but it was nice to see the arrows fly harmlessly by my company.

            When the fighting ended, we were left with a camp full of bodies and supplies. They too seemed to be stolen from locals, and we decided to do the same with them as we were the mage camp. I picked up as many arrows as would fit in my quiver without hindering the draw ability, and went through several different bows, trying to find one with a draw that didn’t hurt my hands as badly. I would need gloves, and I’d need to train, but I had a feeling I was going to lean more toward the bow than the sword.

            It shouldn’t have taken me so long to decide on it, I favored bows in games like Skyrim. I liked sneaking around and shooting my enemies before they knew what hit them. I was a sniper, a sneaky bowman, and when I had to get up and personal, I liked axes more than swords.

            But I thought that since this was real life –in a way– I would want something more practical. That my gaming style wouldn’t carry into how I actually would fight.

            It looked like I just might be wrong.

           

 

            We spent a night at camp, the four of us talking like old friends. It was nice. Cassandra complimented my willingness to adjust, and change out my fighting style. She said it was hard for some to break habits. I quickly reminded her I had no fighting habits to break, and the group laughed and moved on to a different conversation.

            It got personal, each giving little tales about themselves and what they’d done. I stuck with vague stories about my parents taking my sister and me out to do things. It ended up being more helpful than they could have known, though they went easy on me. I also confessed I spent more of my childhood under the spoiling attention of my father’s parents, which was why I ended up so soft as an adult.

            I was comforted by their reassurance I wasn’t soft. Going from my life to this wouldn’t be easy on anyone.

            It was good to hear, especially from Cassandra.

            The next morning, we got word that Mother Giselle was ready to speak to us. To me, specifically.

            We made our way down to the refugee camp when the sun was still rising over the horizon. I approached the Mother alone, just as my character had in-game. She looked just like her game self, but her kindness seemed more obvious. Not a part of her could do harm.

            “Mother Giselle?” I asked as I approached. She was kneeling beside an injured man refusing the aid of mages. He relented, and the woman draped in the white and crimson of the Chantry stood to look at me.

            “I am,” she nodded and came toward me. “And you must be the one they’re calling the Herald of Andraste.”

            “Yes,” was all I could get out. “I’m pleased to finally speak with you,” I added and she smiled at me.

            Gesturing for me to walk with her, we started along a path that overlooked most of the camp. “I know of the chantry’s denouncement, and I’m familiar with those behind it.” She had a thick Orlesian accent, just like the game. “I won’t lie to you,” she continued, “Some of them are grandstanding, hoping to increase their chances of becoming the New Divine. Some are simply terrified. So many good people, senselessly taken from us…” she looked away, stopping us. Her gaze drifted down and closed.

            “It was terrible, what happened.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say. “I wish I could do something more.”

            “You can. Go to them. Convince the remaining clerics you are no demon to be feared. They have heard only frightful tales of you. Give them something else to believe,” she smiled just a little.

            I had almost forgotten about all of the public speaking I would have to do as the ‘main character’. The one-on-one stuff was easy enough, but I knew there were going to be times I was going to have to talk in front of many people. I hated speech class in high school, and college was even worse. Now it was a step up from both of them because not only were there going to be more people, but I was far more important in their eyes.

            Mother Giselle must have read the doubt in my eyes as she continued without dialogue from me. “Let me put it this way: you needn’t convince them all. You just need some of them to… _doubt_ ,” she smiled at me, comfortingly. “Their power is their unified voice. Take that from them, and you receive the time you need.”

            “Thank you for your help,” I said and bowed my head.

            “I honestly don’t know if you’ve been touched by fate or sent to help us… but I hope,” she said and looked out over the people of the camp. “Hope is what we need now. The people will listen to your rallying call, as they will listen to no other. You could build the Inquisition into a force that will deliver us… or destroy us.” Hearing her say it here, in real life –sort of– with my own ears, and not through a TV screen, the words sank deeper and felt heavier. Mother Giselle looked back to me. “I will go to Haven and provide Sister Leliana with the names of those in the Chantry who would be amenable to a gathering. It is not much, but I will do whatever I can.”

            We parted ways after that, Mother Giselle returned to helping the starved and injured while I went back to camp and helped decide we would go back to Haven now that we had a strong foothold in the Hinterlands. It was nice being in ‘real life’ Inquisition, because I wasn’t the only one doing stuff. All the quests were still getting done, in time, but other people were completing them. All the camps, and more, had been set up in strategic positions, and some of the small side quests had been finished while my team and I were out.

            I settled on my bedroll and looked up at the sky, watching it change color as the sunset. In the morning we would leave, and I knew it was going to be a long, tiresome journey back. There was no time skipping or montages, it was just… real.

            Another plus side on ‘real life’ Inquisition was actually the times of day. I never got to see the lands in any other time of day than what was preset for the zone. But here, I got to see night, day, sunrise and set, and everything in between.

            Solas sat down beside me, crossing his legs carefully and letting his body relax. He didn’t say anything, only looked up at the sky with me. We stayed like that for some time, and then he reclined and rolled onto his side to look at me.

            “Is anything else different from your vision?”

            I thought about all the little differences and decided to list them for him. He was a details kind of guy, and the more I told him, the more fascinated he became. I told him about the weather, time of day, the look of the landscape, even the way the people moved. It was the same, I could tell it was, but I also knew there were so many differences. He listened to all of them, interested like a child listening to a fairytale.

            And when I began to yawn, he asked what we would watch tonight. I couldn’t tell him. “I’m surprised I keep going to the theater, normally I get a dream once, and years later I might have it again, but it’s different and I know in the dream that it happened and it’s different. This theater…” I shook my head.

            “Dreams, where you’re from, must work differently. Here, you have more control, what you want will stay as long as you want it,” he explained and smiled. “If you want to dream something else, please don’t allow me to keep you.”

            “Maybe not a theater,” I said and thought about all the other places we could watch movies. “I’ll see where we end up.”

            “Okay,” he smiled and rolled onto his back. “I’ll be right behind you.”

            I was just about to get comfortable when another voice came from the foot of my bedroll. “Where are you two going?”

            I looked up at Varric and raised an eyebrow and the smirk on his lips. He looked between us, and I cleared my throat. “It’s not what you think. He’s… we’re,” I wasn’t really sure if I could just _say_ it.

            But then, Solas did, “Christi is showing me her dreams.”

            Varric chuckled and nodded, “I’m sure that’s fun. Have you seen any of those xenomorphs?” he asked, pointing to my foot.

            Solas’ smile widened and he sat up. “Yes, they’re sublime. Terrifying, but awe-inspiring.”

            “Yes,” Varric breathed, his expression twisting into doubt. “I’m sure seeing them in _her_ dreams really makes them look cuddly.”

            “Oh no,” Solas shook his head and smirked up at the dwarf. “Don’t try to touch it. That won’t end well.”

            “At least  _that_ part you finally seem to understand. I knew that the moment I saw the thing of her foot.” Varric made his way over to the bedroll on Solas’ other side and got settled in. “Do you know what you’re going to show him tonight, Dreamer?”

            “I have an idea,” I nodded and rolled onto my side to get comfortable. I was facing Solas, but tried not to think about it. He settled back in and rolled onto his side to look at me as well.

            “When you’re ready,” he said with excitement sparking his eye.

            “I can’t just… fall asleep,” I snorted and closed my eyes. “I have to drift off. Just let it happen.”

            He didn’t say anything else, but I could practically feel his smile. It made me grin as well, and I slowly drifted off to the sounds of birds, bugs, and the camp’s late night activities.

 

 

            _There was a knock on my apartment door and I sprung off my bed to run through the hall, kitchen, and to the entrance. I didn’t bother looking through the peephole, and pulled the door open with a smile._

_“Solas,” I beamed and gestured behind me. “Come in!”_

_“This is where you live?” he looked at the concrete stairs that led up and down from my corner, second-floor apartment. The day outside was bright, sunny, and you could see the other stone apartment buildings through the stairwell. Cars were parked in their spots lining the buildings, and landscapers were working on cutting grass and setting mulch in the gardens._

_“Yeah, my parents have a house, but this is where I’m at while I’m at college.” I stepped back so he could come into the dim apartment, out of the bright summer day. My roommates were at work, so we had the whole thousand-square-foot apartment to ourselves. I gave him a short tour, the entry with the laundry room off to the left, then we entered the open kitchen-living space, I showed him the refrigerator because I knew he’d get a kick out of that. The mage even stuck his hand in to feel the chilling sensation. We moved on into the living room, past the massive breakfast bar from the kitchen. The couch and chair faced a flat screen hanging on the wall. He was impressed there was no projector this time, that the picture came right from the screen itself._

_Then we moved on to the hallway that led to the four bedrooms. I pointed out each and named the roommate that lived in it. Then I came to my open door and led him inside._

_My room had a short hall because the closet cut into the space, and the door hugged the wall. When you got past the closet the room opened up with a full bed pushed into the corner, a window beside it with a cheap Wal-Mart nightstand under the sill, at the foot of the bed sat a desk chair –despite the desk being against the right wall– facing the thirty-two inch flat screen perched on the dresser inside the two feet deep closet. On the shelf above the TV sat two generations of PlayStations, and on the ground in the gap between the doorway and the dresser sat an iBuyPower gaming computer tower. Another nightstand acted as a table beside the desk chair at the foot of the bed._

_In the other corner, past the desk and bathroom door, sat my hamper and trashcan under a corner-shelving unit holding memorabilia from my favorite fandoms. I waved to everything, pointing it out to the elf before stepping to the full bathroom to spend_ several _minutes explaining running water, the purpose of a toilet, and how great showers were. Solas ended up sitting on the floor in front of my desk to look at the cube shelves of books, games, and movies under it. He ran his fingers over the textbooks for my classes. He asked some questions about them, but we quickly went to the movies._

_He looked at the video games, noticing the differing appearance of the cases, “They all have this symbol on the top.” His thumb brushed the PS2, PS3, and PS4 tops._

_“Yeah, those are games, they’re like the movies, but instead of you just watching, you move the character around and sometimes to make choices.” I tapped along them. “These are older, I have the PlayStation 4 out in the living room for my roommates to use as well, but I have the older systems in here with the computer.” I realized most of what I said went right over his head and smiled. “We’ll get to games after we finish the movies.”_

_“That sounds fantastic,” Solas said, his gaze meeting mine._

_“On to Predator then.”_


	8. So Just Know That it's Okay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back at Haven, everything winds down for a moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Just Know That it's Okay  
> ~Game Over, Falling in Reverse

            Three days later, we were approaching Haven. It was a welcome sight. My back and legs were killing me, sore from walking and riding. The sun was setting and I was yawning, imagining the bed I had in my little prison cabin. It would be so nice to _not_ sleep on the ground.

            Cullen, Leliana, and Josephine stood at the gates to welcome us. It was nice to see them. I didn’t want to just rush up to the Commander and company, I needed to play it at least a little cool.

            So, I quickly dismounted to walk Dr Pepper to the stable and get her taken care of. I was just finishing with her saddle when I turned around and ran right into Cullen.

            “Oh,” I gasped and nearly dropped the tack. The Commander grabbed hold of it to keep it from falling.

            “I’m sorry I startled you,” he said and offered a smile.

            “It’s okay, I just wasn’t expecting you,” I cleared my throat and shrugged. “I figured you’d stay up there and wait for us to come to you.”

            “We have much to talk about, I thought it best to get started.” He moved the saddle over to the rack it was kept on. I bit my lip as I turned back to Pepper and tried to think of something to say. He continued without prompting though, “We have the watch towers near completion and Horse Master Dennet has sent a letter requesting soldiers come to start guiding the horses back."

            I nodded, “That’s good news.”

            “It is. We have also set up a place for Mother Giselle to stay during her time here.”

            As I finished with Pepper, he informed me of the unrest between mages and templars in Haven. There have been several fights, but so far no one had been seriously injured or died. It was a lot to take in so late after a long ride, but I did my best not to let my fatigue show.

            Cullen was an observant one, though. “Christi.”

            I blinked and looked up into his gold eyes. The firelight made them look like liquid honey. “Yes?”

            “You need to sleep,” he said, his lips quirking.

            “Oh no, I’m fine,” I said with a dismissive flick of the wrist. “Just need some caffeine, a soda or something would be great.”

            His brows drew together and he tilted his head just slightly. I almost couldn’t stop my hand from firmly planting my palm on my forehead.

            “Yes, I do need sleep,” I agreed and smiled. “Thank you, Commander. This has all been very enlightening.”

            “Cullen is fine,” he said and waved for me to walk ahead of him.

            We walked in comfortable silence up to the cabin I used. He stopped at the doorway and frowned. I raised a brow, but before I could ask he continued.

            “I’ll have the locks on the outside taken off. You’re not a prisoner anymore.”

            I had completely forgotten about the locks. Now that he mentioned them I noticed the big black metal bolts that maybe a qunari could break through, but I had no hope of. “Oh, you don’t have to,” I shrugged. “They’re fine. I understand how some people might feel better with them there.”

            “Then those people need to reevaluate their position,” Cullen said simply. “You are the Herald of Andraste, you are _not_ an Inquisition prisoner.”

            I smiled at that and rested my hand on his chest plate. The metal was cool in the night air and I almost didn’t notice how he stood a little straighter and took in a breath. “Thank you, Cullen.”

            “Of course,” he nodded his head in a bow. I wished the lighting outside my cabin was better, I wanted to know if he blushed. “Rest well, Christi. We have a lot to discuss in the morning.”

            “Good night, Cullen,” I smiled at him. He waited there until I stepped into my cabin and closed the door. From there I could hear his steps faintly as he walked away.

 

 

            I was startled awake from my dream –watching Predators with Solas– by the sound of yelling. I flung myself from the bed and froze, listening to it.

            Accusations of murder were being thrown around and I quickly realized what was happening.

            I got dressed immediately and rushed outside, up the hill, through the crowd as best as I could to get to the Templars and mages at each other’s throats.

            “Your kind killed the Most Holy!” One man in armor grabbed a mage by the robes and threw him back into another.

            “Lies–” he grunted and stood straighter. “Your kind let her die,” he seethed through gritted teeth.

            The templar reached for his sword. I jumped forward just as quickly as Cullen did. The Commander put a firm hand on the man’s sword arm, stopping the draw, and put a hand up toward the mage whom I stood in front of. Stupidly, I might add. What was I going to do? Stop the blade with my body? That seemed to be my plan.

            Cullen seemed to appreciate the assistance, though. “Enough!” he roared and pushed the templar back so he staggered.

            “Knight-Captain,” the man started to protest.

            “That is not my title. We are _not_ templars any longer. We are _all_ part of the Inquisition!” He waved his hands in the direction of the men acting as heads of the rivaling factions. I stood a little straighter and gave a meaningful look to those that met my gaze. And then I saw Chancellor Roderick coming up the divide.

            “And what does that mean, exactly?” he asked, drawing Cullen’s eye.

            “Back already, Chancellor? Haven’t you done enough?” The Commander crossed his arms, making the fur piled on his shoulders puff up, giving him a broader shoulder span and effectively making him look even more built than he was. The Chancellor played off his intimidation.

            “I’m curious, Commander,” he said, looking around, “as to how your Inquisition and its ‘Herald’ will restore order as you’ve promised.” He spun around to speak to the crowd.

            The annoyance on Cullen’s face could almost have been disgust. “Of course you are.” Then he turned to address everyone, “Back to your duties, all of you!”

            As they filtered away, I came closer to Cullen, a sympathetic look on my face, “I should have said something.”

            He smiled a little, “There was nothing to say.” His lips fell and he sighed, arms coming back up to cross in front of him. “Mages and templars were already at war. Now they’re blaming each other for the Divine’s Death.”

            Roderick cut in, “Which is why we require a _proper_ authority to guide them back to order.”

            Cullen looked like he was trying not to laugh, “Who, you? Random clerics who weren’t important enough to be at the Conclave?” The shot had more bite standing here than it did listening in from the game.

            “The rebel Inquisition and its so-called ‘Herald of Andraste’? I think not,” Roderick threw a glare my way for good measure and Cullen stepped right into it. He was far taller than the Chancellor, at least half a foot, if not more.

            I stepped around Cullen and looked right into Roderick’s eyes. “I know you’re afraid, and I know you want the best for everyone. This façade you put up is a good one, but I can see right through it.” I put myself right in front of him. “The Inquisition is going to be what saves the Chantry. It’s going to aid in determining the next Divine, and it will put an end to the chaos. The Inquisition will find the Divine’s murderer, and he will answer for what he’s done. But if you keep this up, you’ll burn the bridges you need to stay alive through this war.” I remembered him dying in the tent, accompanied by Dorian. No one mourned him. He was all but forgotten after he was thanked for saving the remains of the Inquisition. The memory almost made me cry, but I stuffed it down to get through what I was saying to him now. “You think we’re acting against the Chantry, but we’re acting in response to their neglect.”

            Stubbornness showed on his face, replacing the flicker of fear and confusion. “That won’t help restore order in the here and now.”

            My jaw tightened, “And dropping all our efforts until a Divine is chosen will?”

            It was a rhetorical question, but he took it in stride, “How can the Chantry work toward finding the next Divine if they’re worried about an attack from an upstart organization?”

            “Why are you even here?” I asked, brows drawn together. “Acting as a one-man army against our so-called evil?” I raised a brow at him and he smiled, crossing his own arms, but it did nothing for his lean frame.

            “Sometimes it only takes one voice to bring light to the darkness.”

            “He’s toothless,” Cullen interjected. With a hand on my shoulder, he urged me back, “There’s no point turning him into a martyr simply because he runs at the mouth.”

            “Your _templar_ knows where to draw the line,” Roderick looked me in the eye. “Do you?”

            “I haven’t hit you yet,” I said. But the reason was because of my foreknowledge. I knew what came next, I knew him better than anyone else did. I knew we needed him.

            Well. I knew what he knew, so actually, we didn’t need him. But I didn’t think it was right to kill him or run him off and take his one redeeming quality away.

            “The Chancellor’s a good indicator of what to expect in Val Royeaux,” Cullen added and gestured for me to start walking away, effectively killing the conversation with Roderick. “Best not to get hung up on his opinions. He would not grieve if something were to happen to you, or if you were used as a scapegoat by the restored Chantry to forward peace.”

            Roderick started saying something about the Maker being displeased, but the crunching of snow under Cullen’s and my feet drowned it out. He was taking us to the tavern. A small building with a single bar, single floor, single bard, and single drink other than water. We weren’t coming to drink, though.

            He pulled a seat out and waited for me to take it before moving to the bar. “Are you hungry, Christi?”

            Oh Maker, was he going to cook for me? “A bit,” I said honestly, my mouth going dry.

            There was no one else in the tavern right now. It seemed whoever ran it trusted Haven not to tamper with anything. Cullen found some bread and eggs, then he started placing things beside the cooking pit. “It should only take a few moments once the fire is lit.”

            “I didn’t know you cooked,” I couldn’t get the smile on my lips to go away.

            He chuckled and came back over to the table, shedding the fur drape. I noticed then he wasn’t wearing his armor. I hadn’t caught the lack of shiny plate earlier, I guess I just assumed he always wore it, like in game. “As a templar, we would spend weeks traveling. If you didn’t know how to hunt and cook, you were left with rations. They’re not very satisfying,” he said in a hushed tone as if it were a secret.

            “You hunt, too?”

            “Some, I am not the best. Taking down deer with a sword isn’t the most efficient way, though,” he went back to the cooking station and knelt beside it, fixing up the eggs and toasting the bread beside it. I thought I saw him add butter, I couldn’t quite see from my position by the door.

            As he cooked, a couple other people came in, mostly soldiers and former templars who also helped themselves to supplies for cooking. No one took more than they needed. It made me smile.

            A few people stopped to talk to me, asking me questions about Andraste and my moments in the Fade. I was as honest with them as I could afford to be, and tried to remember as much of the lore from the game as I could.

            Cullen returned to the table and gave me a plate. My mouth watered and I dug in after the Commander prayed over it. We ate in comfortable silence.

            And then Leliana and Josephine showed up.

            “I told you they would be here,” the spymaster smiled and gestured. Josephine sighed in relief and I realized she must have been worried.

            “Did I miss something?” I asked and the diplomat sat next to me, putting a body between Cullen and I. Leliana followed suit.

            “We had a meeting planned for this morning. Cassandra went searching for you after the… event this morning. She was under the impression you would be with Solas. I knew Cullen preferred to eat breakfast here, and when I was told you were with him this morning, I knew you would be found here as well.” Leliana picked one of Cullen’s toast halves and started nibbling on it. He seemed to miss her taking it off his plate, but when she started chewing he realized just what happened.

            “Where is Cassandra now?”

            “Looking for you,” Josephine smiled. “But if you are here, she will not find you for some time.”

            “We should get some work done while we wait for her, yes?” Leliana pulled a stack of papers out of her robe and laid it on the table, smoothing it out so that she knocked Cullen’s plate.

            The Commander frowned and picked his platter up and finished eating while holding it. I tried not to smile. He was too polite to do anything back, and Leliana couldn’t help but tease and walk on him because of it.

            “The plans for Val Royeaux,” Josephine pointed. “Who will come with you, how you’ll get there, how long it’ll take, the supplies you need: everything.”

            “Sounds good,” I said and picked up the paper, looking down the list. “You thought of everything.”

            “We are good at our jobs,” Leliana said modestly, chewing on another piece of toast. I realized then it was my last one and frowned at her. Cullen smirked and I tried not to look at him, my cheeks flushing.

            “Would you like something to eat, Josephine? It seems Leliana has helped herself,” Cullen stood, taking my empty plate. I thanked him and he bowed his head.

            “I could never say no to your cooking, Cullen.”

            “I would cherish my own plate as well,” Leliana cut in, but Cullen didn’t acknowledge her as he went back to the cooking station. “He’ll make me something,” she said casually and flipped through the papers. “He’s a good man.”

            “He is,” I agreed and then buried my face in the paperwork as both women looked at me.

            “Herald,” Josephine smiled and I glanced up at her, more to correct her name use, but she continued. “I know we haven’t gotten to talk much, I was curious if you could tell me anything of your past and upbringing. I cannot find anything in my own research and I have many interested parties asking lots of questions.”

            “Oh,” I ran my hand up through my hair and tried to think. “My family isn’t significant here. I’m the child of two soldiers, I have a younger sister,” I shrugged and tried to think where my family should be from.

            “Don’t leave out growing up in Kirkwall, Christi,” Varric’s voice came from over my shoulder and my heart skipped.

            “When did you get here?” I asked, turning in my seat. Solas was right behind him, a soft smile on his lips.

            “Just now, Ruffles wants to know where you’re from, who your people are. You told us,” the dwarf gestured to Solas and himself with a crooked smile. “It took a lot of prying, I don’t imagine you’ll have much luck with her,” Varric said to Josephine.

            “Why so secretive?” she asked me and I shrugged.

            “I… don’t really like talking about it,” I said and looked down.

            Varric pulled a chair up and sat between Josephine and me. “Her family was killed in the mage rebellion. Her mother was a templar, and her father a city guard.”

            Josephine touched her mouth in shock, “I am so sorry, Herald, I should have–”

            “It’s okay, Josephine,” I said and swallowed hard. I wasn’t sure why Varric was covering for me, but it was very much appreciated.

            “Your mother was a templar?” Cullen returned, putting two plates down at the able before reclaiming his seat. I noticed his gaze flick to Solas sitting on my other side, next to Leliana.

            I opened my mouth, but Varric took the stage again, patting my hand comfortingly. “I’ll tell him, Dreamer.” Then he turned to Cullen, “From what I remember of your time in Kirkwall, you wouldn’t have seen her much. She spent most of her time in the Chantry. I think she was actually Choir-boy’s attendant.”

            “You mean Sebastian Veal,” Cullen lifted his chin and an eyebrow. “You’re right, I didn’t see much of her then. What was her name?”

            “Felina,” I said softly. It was a little easier than it should have been to act distraught.

            “I cannot say I remember her,” Cullen said and frowned, looking a little disappointed.

            “Don’t beat yourself up, Curly,” Varric chuckled. “There were a lot of templars in Kirkwall.”

            “Does that mean we ever saw each other?”

            I was surprised by the question and glanced up at Cullen. “I, uh, couldn’t tell you. Kirkwall’s a big city.”

            “It is.”

            The silence got a little weird until Leliana pointed a fork to Josephine. “Way to pick breakfast topics, Josie. You’re grounded.”

            Josephine opened her mouth in surprise and protest, but everyone laughed and she realized it was a joke. I smiled and comforted them with saying it was fine.

            After we split up and I went to Varric and pulled him aside. We were outside, by the wall circling Haven, away from prying eyes and ears. “What was all that and how did you…?” I didn’t really know where that sentence was going.

            He smirked up at me. “Chuckles told me everything.”

            “Solas…?” My fingers curled up into fists and I took a deep breath, trying to push away the feeling of betrayal because, frankly, it saved my ass. And he probably knew it would. “So, what all do you know now?"

            “Theoretically, everything he knows. You’re not from… _Thedas_. Where you’re from is very different: the carts don’t need horses to pull them, pictures move with sound….” He shook his head.

            “Okay, so he told you a bit, yeah.”

            Varric sighed and looked me over, “Why didn’t you tell me sooner, kid? I could have helped out more…”

            “I… didn’t know how you’d react. I knew,” I stopped and blinked away stressed tears, “I knew you’d be one of the few that would help, but I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t even really tell Solas, he just saw my dreams and it… happened.”

            “Hey,” he patted my arm. “It’s okay, Dreamer, I’m not mad. Don’t cry.”

            “It’s just,” I sat down, my knees feeling weak. “It’s nice to not have to lie to you, and Solas.”

            “Seeker’s going to rip all our heads off when she finds out,” he sighed and leaned against the wall beside me. I rubbed my face and shook my head.

            “I don’t want to think about how much she’ll hate me then.”

            “And you’ll want to tell Curly soon.”

            “What?” I looked up at him and he smirked.

            “Relationships built on lies aren’t healthy, kid.”

            I swallowed and thought about his words. Then I blinked and narrowed my eyes up at him, “Relationships?”

            “You two spend a lot of time looking at each other, you’d have to be blind to miss it.” Then he shifted his weight and rubbed his chin. “Not sure about Chuckles, though. You and he seem pretty close, but he’s not so easy to read.”

            “What, you think Solas… and me?” I resisted laughing. “I’d have to be an elf for that to work,” I blurted before I could stop myself.

            “He does seem like the picky type doesn’t he?” Varric chuckled.

            He had no idea. In game, only a female elf could romance Solas. I didn’t imagine any interest he showed in me was actually for me, but for my dreams and studying my world. “He’s just interested in where I came from, I think,” I said and took a deep breath. Then I stood and stretched. “I have to do some training. Then we’re going to Val Royeaux.”

            “If you need help, let me know,” he grinned and I nodded, agreeing I would before I headed off out of the gate.


End file.
